xref: /freebsd/usr.sbin/efivar/efivar.8 (revision 5bb3134a8c21cb87b30e135ef168483f0333dabb)
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25.\" $FreeBSD$
26.\"
27.Dd April 7, 2021
28.Dt EFIVAR 8
29.Os
30.Sh NAME
31.Nm efivar
32.Nd UEFI environment variable interaction
33.Sh SYNOPSIS
34.Nm
35.Op Fl abdDHlLNpqRtuw
36.Op Fl n Ar name
37.Op Fl f Ar file
38.Op Fl -append
39.Op Fl -ascii
40.Op Fl -attributes
41.Op Fl -binary
42.Op Fl -delete
43.Op Fl -device-path
44.Op Fl -fromfile Ar file
45.Op Fl -guid
46.Op Fl -hex
47.Op Fl -list-guids
48.Op Fl -list
49.Op Fl -load-option
50.Op Fl -name Ar name
51.Op Fl -no-name
52.Op Fl -print
53.Op Fl -print-decimal
54.Op Fl -quiet
55.Op Fl -raw-guid
56.Op Fl -utf8
57.Op Fl -write
58.Sh DESCRIPTION
59This program manages
60.Dq Unified Extensible Firmware Interface
61.Pq UEFI
62environment variables.
63UEFI variables have three part: A namespace, a name and a value.
64The namespace is a GUID that is self assigned by the group defining the
65variables.
66The name is a Unicode name for the variable.
67The value is binary data.
68All Unicode data is presented to the user as UTF-8.
69.Pp
70The following options are available:
71.Bl -tag -width 20m
72.It Fl n Ar name Fl -name Ar name
73Specify the name of the variable to operate on.
74The
75.Ar name
76argument is the GUID of the variable, followed by a dash, followed by the
77UEFI variable name.
78The GUID may be in numeric format, or may be one of the well known
79symbolic name (see
80.Fl -list-guids
81for a complete list).
82.It Fl f Ar file Fl -fromfile Ar file
83When writing or appending to a variable, take the data for the
84variable's value from
85.Ar file
86instead of from the command line.
87This flag implies
88.Fl -write
89unless the
90.Fl -append
91or
92.Fl -print
93flags are given.
94This behavior is not well understood and is currently unimplemented
95for writes.
96When
97.Fl -print
98is specified, the contents of the file are used as the value to
99print using any other specified flags.
100This is used primarily for testing purposes for more complicated
101variable decoding.
102.It Fl a Fl -append
103Append the specified value to the UEFI variable rather than replacing
104it.
105.It Fl t Ar attr Fl -attributes Ar attr
106Specify, in hexadecimal, the attributes for this
107variable.
108See section 7.2 (GetVariable subsection, Related Definitions) of the
109UEFI Specification for hex values to use.
110.It Fl A Fl -ascii
111Display the variable data as modified ascii: All printable characters
112are printed, while unprintable characters are rendered as a two-digit
113hexadecimal number preceded by a % character.
114.It Fl b Fl -binary
115Display the variable data as binary data.
116Usually will be used with the
117.Fl N
118or
119.Fl -no-name
120flag.
121Useful in scripts.
122.It Fl D Fl -delete
123Delete the specified variable.
124May not be used with either the
125.Fl -write
126or the
127.Fl -append
128flags.
129No
130.Ar value
131may be specified.
132.It Fl d Fl -device Fl -device-path
133Interpret the variables printed as UEFI device paths and print the
134UEFI standard string representation.
135.It Fl g Fl -guid
136Convert GUIDs to names if they are known
137.Po and show them up in
138.Fl -list-guids
139.Pc .
140.It Fl H Fl -hex
141List variable data as a hex dump.
142.It Fl L Fl -list-guids
143Lists the well known GUIDs.
144The names listed here may be used in place of the numeric GUID values.
145These names will replace the numeric GUID values unless
146.Fl -raw-guid
147flag is specified.
148.It Fl l Fl -list
149List all the variables.
150If the
151.Fl -print
152flag is also listed, their values will be displayed.
153.It Fl -load-option
154Decode the variable as if it were a UEFI Boot Option, including information about what device and/or paths the UEFI DevicePaths decode to.
155.It Fl N Fl -no-name
156Do not display the variable name.
157.It Fl p Fl -print
158Print the value of the variable.
159.It Fl q Fl -quiet
160When an error occurs, exit with a non-zero value without outputting any error messages.
161Otherwise, produce the normal output and exit with a zero status.
162.It Fl R Fl -raw-guid
163Do not substitute well known names for GUID numeric values in output.
164.It Fl u Fl -utf8
165Treat the value of the variable as UCS2 and convert it to UTF8 and
166print the result.
167.It Fl w Fl -write
168Write (replace) the variable specified with the value specified from
169standard input.
170No command line option to do this is available since UEFI variables
171are binary structures rather than strings.
172.Xr echo 1
173.Fl n
174can be used to specify simple strings.
175.It Ar name
176Display the
177.Ar name
178environment variable.
179.El
180.Sh COMPATIBILITY
181The
182.Nm
183program is intended to be compatible (strict superset) with a program
184of the same name included in the Red Hat libefivar package,
185but the
186.Fl d
187and
188.Fl -print-decimal
189flags are not implemented and never will be.
190.Pp
191The
192.Fl d
193flag is short for
194.Fl -device-path .
195.Sh SEE ALSO
196Appendix A of the UEFI specification has the format for GUIDs.
197All GUIDs
198.Dq Globally Unique Identifiers
199have the format described in RFC 4122.
200.Sh HISTORY
201The
202.Nm
203utility first appeared in
204.Fx 11.1 .
205