Linux: Finding What Distro We Are Using

Dashrender

I'm confused - wouldn't you have to know what distro you're using to run those commands.

i.e. you can't run the

 cat /etc/gentoo-release

command on Ubuntu, can you? and if you can, can you run it on another Linux family line?

JaredBusch

@Dashrender said in Linux: Finding What Distro We Are Using:

I'm confused - wouldn't you have to know what distro you're using to run those commands.

i.e. you can't run the
 cat /etc/gentoo-release
command on Ubuntu, can you? and if you can, can you run it on another Linux family line?

Of course you can. You simply get an error that there is no file.

the command is cat the parameter is the path and file name.

JaredBusch

[email protected]:[~] $ cat /etc/gentoo-release
cat: /etc/gentoo-release: No such file or directory
[email protected]:[~] $ cat /etc/redhat-release
CentOS Linux release 7.3.1611 (Core)
[email protected]:[~] $

scottalanmiller

@Dashrender said in Linux: Finding What Distro We Are Using:

I'm confused - wouldn't you have to know what distro you're using to run those commands.

i.e. you can't run the
 cat /etc/gentoo-release
command on Ubuntu, can you? and if you can, can you run it on another Linux family line?

You have to know what to look for and look for it. Same with anything. How do you know that you are on Windows? You rely on look and feel, knowing ahead of time what it is. If you make a Linux desktop look just like Windows and answer to Windows commands, how would you determine that it is really Windows?

It's harder than it sounds.

You also have to know that it is Linux, what if it was AIX or HP-UX? At some point you just have to know what things look like and poke around.

A simple solution for Linux machines is to do this...

ls /etc/ | grep release

scottalanmiller

You can do this as well:

cat /etc/*release

And see the output of every file with the name all at once. But you might get more than you wanted.

thwr

Most distros will also give you a hint when opening a session (SSH, bash, getty etc). But it's nice to see such a summary, thanks.

JaredBusch

@scottalanmiller said in Linux: Finding What Distro We Are Using:

You can do this as well:
cat /etc/*release
And see the output of every file with the name all at once. But you might get more than you wanted.

For exampels, CentOS 7 has 4 files that match.

[email protected]:[~] $ ls /etc/*release
/etc/centos-release  /etc/os-release  /etc/redhat-release  /etc/system-release

It would output this disaster

[email protected]:[~] $ cat /etc/*release
CentOS Linux release 7.3.1611 (Core)
NAME="CentOS Linux"
VERSION="7 (Core)"
ID="centos"
ID_LIKE="rhel fedora"
VERSION_ID="7"
PRETTY_NAME="CentOS Linux 7 (Core)"
ANSI_COLOR="0;31"
CPE_NAME="cpe:/o:centos:centos:7"
HOME_URL="https://www.centos.org/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.centos.org/"

CENTOS_MANTISBT_PROJECT="CentOS-7"
CENTOS_MANTISBT_PROJECT_VERSION="7"
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT="centos"
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT_VERSION="7"

CentOS Linux release 7.3.1611 (Core)
CentOS Linux release 7.3.1611 (Core)

JaredBusch

What can be done if you do not want to rely on a maybe like

cat /etc/os-release
cat /etc/lsb-release

Is to write your own if/then script to find the data you need.

momurda

@Dashrender Yes that is generally true. However you usually are only going to have 2 options, redhat_release or debian as those are by far the two most common in use in any business environment.
also the os-release seems to be very new for distros. It is not in my centOS 6.6 or 6.8 but is in my debian 8+, but not in a debian 5 server i have.
typing
cat /etc/os then tab complete will get you possibilities with os in etc dir. If os-release isnt there it isnt.
so you can cat /etc/r then tab complete to see redhat-release

stacksofplates

/proc/version usually has pertinent information across most systems.

Edit: I looked closer. It's just the OS name (RHEL/Ubuntu) and kernel version. Never mind.