1 Android's shell and utilities 2 ============================= 3 4 Since IceCreamSandwich Android has used 5 [mksh](https://www.mirbsd.org/mksh.htm) as its shell. Before then it used 6 [ash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almquist_shell) (which actually 7 remained in the tree up to and including KitKat). 8 9 Initially Android had a very limited command-line provided by its 10 own "toolbox" binary. These days almost everything is supplied by 11 [toybox](http://landley.net/toybox/) instead. 12 13 We started moving a few of the more important tools to full 14 BSD implementations in JellyBean before we started in earnest in 15 Lollipop. Lollipop was a major break with the past in many ways (LP64 16 support and the switch to ART both having lots of knock-on effects around 17 the system), so although this was the beginning of the end of toolbox it 18 (a) didn't stand out given all the other systems-level changes and (b) 19 in Marshmallow we changed direction and started the move to toybox. 20 21 The lists below show what tools were provided and where they came from in 22 each release starting with Gingerbread. This doesn't tell the full story, 23 because the toolbox implementations did have bugs fixed and options added 24 over the years. Gingerbread's rm, for example, supported `-r`/`-R` but not 25 `-f`. But this gives you an idea of what was available in any given release, 26 and how usable it was likely to be. 27 28 29 Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) 30 ------------------------- 31 32 BSD: cat dd newfs\_msdos 33 34 toolbox: chmod chown cmp date df dmesg getevent getprop hd id ifconfig 35 iftop insmod ioctl ionice kill ln log ls lsmod lsof mkdir mount mv 36 nandread netstat notify printenv ps reboot renice rm rmdir rmmod route 37 schedtop sendevent setconsole setprop sleep smd start stop sync top 38 umount uptime vmstat watchprops wipe 39 40 41 Android 4.0 (IceCreamSandwich) 42 ------------------------------ 43 44 BSD: cat dd newfs\_msdos 45 46 toolbox: chmod chown cmp date df dmesg getevent getprop hd id ifconfig 47 iftop insmod ioctl ionice kill ln log ls lsmod lsof mkdir mount mv 48 nandread netstat notify printenv ps reboot renice rm rmdir rmmod route 49 schedtop sendevent setconsole setprop sleep smd start stop sync top 50 touch umount uptime vmstat watchprops wipe 51 52 53 Android 4.1-4.3 (JellyBean) 54 --------------------------- 55 56 BSD: cat cp dd du grep newfs\_msdos 57 58 toolbox: chcon chmod chown clear cmp date df dmesg getenforce getevent 59 getprop getsebool hd id ifconfig iftop insmod ioctl ionice kill ln 60 load\_policy log ls lsmod lsof md5 mkdir mount mv nandread netstat notify 61 printenv ps reboot renice restorecon rm rmdir rmmod route runcon schedtop 62 sendevent setconsole setenforce setprop setsebool sleep smd start stop 63 sync top touch umount uptime vmstat watchprops wipe 64 65 66 Android 4.4 (KitKat) 67 -------------------- 68 69 BSD: cat cp dd du grep newfs\_msdos 70 71 toolbox: chcon chmod chown clear cmp date df dmesg getenforce getevent 72 getprop getsebool hd id ifconfig iftop insmod ioctl ionice kill ln 73 load\_policy log ls lsmod lsof md5 mkdir mkswap mount mv nandread netstat 74 notify printenv ps readlink renice restorecon rm rmdir rmmod route runcon 75 schedtop sendevent setconsole setenforce setprop setsebool sleep smd start 76 stop swapoff swapon sync top touch umount uptime vmstat watchprops wipe 77 78 79 Android 5.0 (Lollipop) 80 ---------------------- 81 82 BSD: cat chown cp dd du grep kill ln mv printenv rm rmdir sleep sync 83 84 toolbox: chcon chmod clear cmp date df dmesg getenforce getevent getprop 85 getsebool hd id ifconfig iftop insmod ioctl ionice load\_policy log ls 86 lsmod lsof md5 mkdir mknod mkswap mount nandread netstat newfs\_msdos 87 nohup notify ps readlink renice restorecon rmmod route runcon schedtop 88 sendevent setenforce setprop setsebool smd start stop swapoff swapon 89 top touch umount uptime vmstat watchprops wipe 90 91 92 Android 6.0 (Marshmallow) 93 ------------------------- 94 95 BSD: dd du grep 96 97 toolbox: df getevent iftop ioctl ionice log ls lsof mount nandread 98 newfs\_msdos ps prlimit renice sendevent start stop top uptime watchprops 99 100 toybox: acpi basename blockdev bzcat cal cat chcon chgrp chmod chown 101 chroot cksum clear comm cmp cp cpio cut date dirname dmesg dos2unix echo 102 env expand expr fallocate false find free getenforce getprop groups 103 head hostname hwclock id ifconfig inotifyd insmod kill load\_policy ln 104 logname losetup lsmod lsusb md5sum mkdir mknod mkswap mktemp modinfo 105 more mountpoint mv netstat nice nl nohup od paste patch pgrep pidof 106 pkill pmap printenv printf pwd readlink realpath restorecon rm rmdir 107 rmmod route runcon sed seq setenforce setprop setsid sha1sum sleep sort 108 split stat strings swapoff swapon sync sysctl tac tail tar taskset tee 109 time timeout touch tr true truncate umount uname uniq unix2dos usleep 110 vmstat wc which whoami xargs yes 111 112 113 Android 7.0 (Nougat) 114 -------------------- 115 116 BSD: dd grep 117 118 toolbox: getevent iftop ioctl log nandread newfs\_msdos ps prlimit 119 sendevent start stop top 120 121 toybox: acpi base64 basename blockdev bzcat cal cat chcon chgrp chmod 122 chown chroot cksum clear comm cmp cp cpio cut date df dirname dmesg 123 dos2unix du echo env expand expr fallocate false find flock free 124 getenforce getprop groups head hostname hwclock id ifconfig inotifyd 125 insmod ionice iorenice kill killall load\_policy ln logname losetup ls 126 lsmod lsof lsusb md5sum mkdir mknod mkswap mktemp modinfo more mount 127 mountpoint mv netstat nice nl nohup od paste patch pgrep pidof pkill 128 pmap printenv printf pwd readlink realpath renice restorecon rm rmdir 129 rmmod route runcon sed seq setenforce setprop setsid sha1sum sleep sort 130 split stat strings swapoff swapon sync sysctl tac tail tar taskset tee 131 time timeout touch tr true truncate tty ulimit umount uname uniq unix2dos 132 uptime usleep vmstat wc which whoami xargs xxd yes 133 134 135 Current AOSP 136 ------------ 137 138 BSD: dd grep 139 140 bzip2: bzcat bzip2 bunzip2 141 142 toolbox: getevent gzip newfs\_msdos gunzip zcat 143 144 toybox: acpi base64 basename blockdev cal cat chcon chgrp chmod chown 145 chroot chrt cksum clear cmp comm cp cpio cut date df diff dirname dmesg 146 dos2unix du echo env expand expr fallocate false file find flock free 147 getenforce getprop groups head hostname hwclock id ifconfig inotifyd 148 insmod ionice iorenice kill killall ln load\_policy log logname losetup 149 ls lsmod lsof lsusb md5sum microcom mkdir mknod mkswap mktemp modinfo 150 modprobe more mount mountpoint mv netstat nice nl nohup od paste patch 151 pgrep pidof pkill pmap printenv printf ps pwd readlink realpath renice 152 restorecon rm rmdir rmmod runcon sed sendevent seq setenforce setprop 153 setsid sha1sum sha224sum sha256sum sha384sum sha512sum sleep sort split 154 start stat stop strings swapoff swapon sync sysctl tac tail tar taskset 155 tee time timeout top touch tr true truncate tty ulimit umount uname uniq 156 unix2dos uptime usleep uudecode uuencode vmstat wc which whoami xargs 157 xxd yes 158
