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