.\" Hey, EMACS: -*- nroff -*- .\" First parameter, NAME, should be all caps .\" Second parameter, SECTION, should be 1-8, maybe w/ subsection .\" other parameters are allowed: see man(7), man(1) .TH XORRISO 1 "October 21, 2007" .\" Please adjust this date whenever revising the manpage. .\" .\" Some roff macros, for reference: .\" .nh disable hyphenation .\" .hy enable hyphenation .\" .ad l left justify .\" .ad b justify to both left and right margins .\" .nf disable filling .\" .fi enable filling .\" .br insert line break .\" .sp insert n+1 empty lines .\" for manpage-specific macros, see man(7) .SH NAME xorriso - creates, loads, manipulates and writes ISO 9660 filesystem images with Rock Ridge extensions. .SH SYNOPSIS .B xorriso .RI [ settings | actions ] .br .SH DESCRIPTION .PP .B xorriso is a program which maps file objects from POSIX compliant filesystems into Rock Ridge enhanced ISO 9660 filesystems and allows session-wise manipulation of such filesystems. It can load the management information of existing ISO images and it writes the session results to optical media or to filesystem objects. .PP A special property of xorriso is that it needs neither an external ISO 9660 formatter program nor an external burn program but rather incorporates the libraries of libburnia-project.org . .SS .B Overview of features: .br Operates on an existing ISO image or creates a new one. .br Copies files from filesystem into the ISO image. .br > Renames or deletes file objects in the ISO image. .br > Changes file properties in the ISO image. .br > Writes result as completely new image to optical media or filesystem objects. .br Writes result as add-on session to appendable multi-session media, to overwriteable media, to regular files, and to block devices. .br Scans for optical drives, blanks re-useable optical media. .br Reads its instructions from command line arguments, dialog, and batch files. .SS .B General information paragraphs: .br Session model .br Libburn drives .br Rock Ridge, POSIX, X/Open .br Command processing .SS .B Session model: .br Unlike other filesystems, ISO 9660 is not intended for read-write operation but rather for being generated in a single sweep and being written to media as a .B session . .br The data content of a session if called filesystem .B image . .PP The written image in its session can then be mounted by the operating system for being used read-only. Linux is able to mount ISO images from block devices, which may represent optical media, other media or via a loop device even regular disk files. .PP This session usage model has been extended on CD media by the concept of .B multi-session , which allows to add information to the CD and gives the mount programs of the operating systems the addresses of the entry points of each session. The mount programs recognize block devices which represent CD media and will by default mount the image in the last session. This session usually contains an updated directory tree for the whole media which governs the data contents in all recorded sessions. .PP The multi-session model of the MMC standard applies to CD-R[W], to DVD-R, to certain states of DVD-RW, and to DVD+R. But it does not apply to overwriteable MMC media like DVD-RAM, DVD+RW, formatted DVD-RW, and of course not to disk files or block devices. Program growisofs by Andy Polyakov showed how to extend this functionality to overwriteable media or disk files which carry valid ISO 9660 filesystems. These two expansion methods are referred as "growing" in this text. .PP xorriso provides growing as well as an own method which produces a completely > new ISO image from the old one and the modifications. This unique xorriso > method produces compact filesystem images with no waste by outdated data blocks > and it can write modified images to targets which are completely unsuitable > for multi-session operations. E.g. fast blanked DVD-RW, named pipes, > character devices, sockets. > Therefore this method is called "modifying". Its drawback is that the target > cannot be the same media which holds the unmodified ISO image but that this > media has to be present while the new image gets written to another media. > So typically one needs either two optical drives or has to work with > filesystem objects as source and/or target media. .PP xorriso adopts the concept of session by loading an eventual image directory tree, allowing to manipulate it by several actions, and to write the new image to the target media. .br The first session of a xorriso run begins by the definition of the input drive with the eventual ISO image and ends by command -commit which triggers writing. A -commit is done automatically when the program ends regularly. .PP After -commit a new session begins. A new input drive can only be chosen as long as the loaded ISO image was not altered. Alteration can be revoked by command -rollback. .PP Writing a session to the target is supposed to be very expensive in terms of time and of consumed space on appendable or write-once media. Therefore all intended manipulations of a particular ISO image should be done in a single session. .br In some special situations (e.g. in a file-to-file situation) it can be useful to store intermediate states and to continue with image manipulations. .SS .B Libburn drives: .br Source of an existing ISO image can be any random access readable libburn drive: optical media with readable data, regular files, block devices. RockRidge info must be present in existing ISO images and it will be generated by the program unconditionally. .PP Target for writing can be any libburn drive. Some drive types do not support the method of growing but only the method of modifying. .br All drive file objects have to offer rw-permission to the user of xorriso. Even those which will not be useable for reading an ISO image. .PP MMC compliant (i.e. optical) drives on Linux usually get addressed by the path of their block device or of their generic character device. E.g. -dev /dev/sr0 -dev /dev/hdc -dev /dev/sg2 .br Get a list of accessible drives by command -devices .br It might be necessary to do this as superuser in order to see all drives and to then allow rw-access for the intended users. .PP Filesystem objects of nearly any type can be addressed by prefix "stdio:" and their path in the filesystem. E.g.: -dev stdio:/tmp/pseudo_drive .br If path leads to a regular file or to a block device then the emulated drive is random access readable and can be used for the method of growing if it already contains a valid ISO 9660 image. Any other file type is not readable via "stdio:" and can only be used as target for the method of modifying. .PP Be aware that especially the superuser can write into any accessible file or device by using its path with the "stdio:" prefix. Addresses without prefix "stdio:" will only work if they lead to a MMC drive. .br One may use option .B -ban_stdio_write to surely prevent this risk and to allow only MMC drives. .SS .B Rock Ridge, POSIX, X/Open: .br .B Rock Ridge is the name of a set of additional informations which enhance an ISO 9660 filesystem so that it can represent a POSIX compliant filesystem with ownership, access permissions, symbolic links, and other attributes. .PP This is what xorriso uses for a decent representation of the disk files within the ISO image. Rock Ridge information is produced with any xorriso image and xorriso will load for manipulation only Rock Ridge enhanced images. .PP xorriso is not named "porriso" because POSIX only guarantees 14 characters of filename length. It is the X/Open System Interface standard XSI which demands a file name length of up to 255 characters and paths of up to 1024 characters. Rock Ridge fulfills this demand. .SS .B Command processing: .br Commands are either actions or settings. They consist of a command word, followed by zero or more parameter words. If the list of parameter words is of variable length (indicated by "[...]") then it has to be terminated by either the word "--" or the end of argument list or an end of an input line. It is not an error if "--" appears after the parameters of a command with a fixed list length. .PP Command and parameter words are either read from program arguments, where one argument is one word, or from input lines where words are recognized similar to the quotation rules of a shell parser. When the program begins then it first looks for its startup files and eventually reads their content as command input lines. Then it interprets the program arguments as commands and parameters and finally it enters dialog mode if command -dialog was executed up to then. .PP The program ends either by command -end or by the end of program arguments if not command -dialog was encountered up to that moment. .br .SH OPTIONS .TP .B Aquiring source and target drive: .TP \fB\-dev\fR address Set input and output drive and load eventual ISO image. Set the image expansion method to growing. Only allowed as long as no ISO image was loaded and altered, or after actions -rollback, or -commit. Violation yields a SORRY event. .br An empty address string gives up the current device without aquiring a new one. .TP > \fB\-indev\fR address Set input drive and load eventual ISO image. Switch from growing to modifying. Same restrictions as with -dev .TP > \fB\-outdev\fR address Set output drive and switch from growing to modifying. .TP \fB\-ban_stdio_write\fR Allow for writing only the usage of optical drives. Disallow to write the result into files of nearly arbitrary type. Once set, this command cannot be revoked. .TP .B Data manipulations: .PP .B disk_path is a path to an object in the local filesystem tree. .br .B iso_rr_path is the Rock Ridge name of a file object in the ISO image. (Do not confuse with the lowlevel ISO 9660 names visible if Rock Ridge gets ignored.) .br The following commands may depend on settings listed further below. .PP Note that in the ISO image you are as powerful as the superuser. Access permissions of the existing files in the image do not apply to your write operations. They are intended to be in effect with the read-only mounted image. .PP If the iso_rr_path of a newly inserted or renamed file leads to an existing file object in the ISO image, then the following collision handling happens: If both objects are directories then they get merged by recursively inserting the subobjects from filesystem into ISO image. > If other file types collide then the setting of command -overwrite decides. > Directories may only be deleted by commands -rmdir or -rm_r. .PP The commands in this section alter the ISO image and not the local filesystem. .TP \fB\-add\fR path [...] Insert the given files or directory trees from filesystem into the ISO image. .br Use the same paths on ISO unless -graft-points is set and the paths have the form iso_rr_path=disk_path . .TP > \fB\-path-list\fR disk_path Like -add but read the pathspecs from file disk_path. One pathspec per line. .TP > \fB\-cp_r\fR disk_path [...] iso_rr_path Insert the given files or directory trees from filesystem into the ISO image. Use the same rules for generating the ISO addresses as would be done with shell command cp -r. .TP \fB\-rm\fR iso_rr_path [...] Delete the given files from the ISO image. .TP \fB\-rm_r\fR iso_rr_path [...] Delete the given files or directory trees from the ISO image. .TP > \fB\-mv\fR iso_rr_path [...] iso_rr_path Rename the given file objects in the ISO tree to the last argument in the list. Use the same rules as with shell command mv. .TP > \fB\-chown\fR uid iso_rr_path [...] Equivalent to shell command chown in the ISO image. .TP > \fB\-chgrp\fR gid iso_rr_path [...] Equivalent to shell command chgrp in the ISO image. .TP > \fB\-chmod\fR mode iso_rr_path [...] Equivalent to shell command chmod in the ISO image. .TP > \fB\-alter_date\fR type timestring iso_rr_path [...] Alter the date entries of a file in the ISO image. type is one of "a", "m", "b" for access time, modification time, both times. .TP > \fB\-mkdir\fR iso_rr_path [...] Create empty directories if they do not exist yet. Existence as directory generates a WARNING event, existence as other file cause a SORRY event. .TP > \fB\-rmdir\fR iso_rr_path [...] Delete empty directories. .TP \fB\-\-\fR Mark end of particular action argument list. .TP \fB\-rollback\fR Discard the manipulated ISO image and reload it from indrive. .TP .B Writing the result: (see also paragraph about settings below) .TP \fB\-commit\fR Perform the write operation. Afterwards eventually make the -outdev the new -indev and load the image from there. Switch from eventual modifiying mode to growing mode. (A subsequent -outdev will activate modification mode.) -commit is performed automatically at end of program if there are uncommitted manipulations pending. So to perform a final write operation with no new -dev and no new loading of image, rather execute option -end. To suppress a final write, execute -rollback -end. .br Writing can last quite a while. It is not unnormal with several types of media if there is no progress visible for the first few minutes and if the drive gnaws on the media for a few minutes after all data have been transmitted. xorriso and the drives are in a client-server relationship. The drives have much freedom about what to do with the media. Some combinations of drives and media simply do not work, despite the promises by vendors of drives and media. If writing fails - or even the drive gets stuck and you need to reboot - then try other media or another drive. The reason for such failure is hardly ever in the code of the various burn programs but you may well try some of those listed below under SEE ALSO. .TP \fB\-eject\fR "in"|"out"|"all" Eject the media in -indev, resp. -outdev, resp. both drives. Note: It is not possible yet to effectively eject disk files. .TP \fB\-blank\fR mode Blank media resp. invalidate ISO image on media if not -dummy is activated. .br This affects only the outdrive not the indrive. If both drives are the same and if the ISO image was altered then this command leads to a SORRY event. Defined modes are: fast, all, deformat, deformat_quickest .br "fast" and "all" make CD-RW and unformatted DVD-RW re-usable, or invalidate overwriteable ISO images. "deformat" converts overwriteable DVD-RW into unformatted ones. "deformat_quickest" is faster but produces media which are only suitable for a single session. xorriso will write onto them only if option -close is set to "on". .br The progress reports issued by some drives while blanking are quite unrealistic. Do not conclude success or failure from the reported percentages. Blanking was successful if no FATAL or SORRY event occured. .TP \fB\-format\fR mode Convert unformatted DVD-RW into overwriteable ones, "de-ice" DVD+RW. As mode submit the word "full" for now. .br This action has no effect on media if -dummy is activated. .br Be warned that re-formatting DVD+RW is considered to be risky to the media's health. DVD+RW get formatted as far as needed during writing, but an entirely formatted media might be better readable in some DVD players. .br The progress reports issued by some drives while formatting are quite unrealistic. Do not conclude success or failure from the reported percentages. Formatting was successful if no FATAL or SORRY event occured. .TP .B Settings for data insertion: .TP RockRidge info will be generated by the program unconditionally. .TP \fB\-J\fR Generate Joliet info additional to Rock Ridge info. .TP > \fB\-f\fR Follow symbolic links. .TP \fB\-uid\fR uid User id to be used for all files when inserted into the new ISO tree. .TP \fB\-gid\fR gid Group id for the same purpose. .TP \fB\-graft-points\fR For xorriso action -add this enables pathspecs of the form .B target=source like with program mkisofs. .TP .B Settings for result writing: .TP > \fB\-V\fR volid Specifies the volume ID. .TP \fB\-speed\fR number[k|m|c|d] Set the burn speed. Default is 0 = maximum speed. Speed can be given in media dependent numbers or as a desired throughput per second in MMC compliant kB (= 1000) or MB (= 1000 kB). Media x-speed factor can be set explicity by "c" for CD and "d" for "DVD". Example speeds: 706k = 706kB/s = 4c = 4xCD 5540k = 5540kB/s = 4d = 4xDVD .br If there is no hint about the speed unit attached, then the media in the outdrive will decide. Default unit is CD = 176.4k. .br MMC drives usually activate their own idea of speed and take the speed value given by the burn program only as upper limit for their own decision. .TP \fB\-dummy\fR "on"|"off" If "on" simulate burning or refuse with SORRY event if no simulation is possible. If "on" do not blank or format. .TP > \fB-fs\fR number["k"|"m"] Set the size of the fifo buffer which smoothens the data stream from ISO image generation to media burning. Default is 4 MiB. The number may be followed by letter "k" or"m" which means unit is kiB (= 1024) or MiB (= 1024 kiB). .TP \fB\-close\fR "on"|"off" If "on" then mark the written media as not appendable any more (if possible at all with the given type of target media). .br This is the contrary of cdrecord, wodim, cdrskin -multi, and is one aspect of growisofs -dvd-compat. .TP .B Exception processing: .TP \fB\-abort_on\fR severity Set the threshhold for events to abort the program. Events are classified by severity : "NEVER", "ABORT", "FATAL", "SORRY", "WARNING", "HINT", "NOTE", "UPDATE", "DEBUG", "ALL" .br Severities "NEVER" and "ALL" do not occur but mark the extreme ends of this potentially expandable range. .br It may become necessary to abort the program anyway, despite the setting by this option. Expect not many "ABORT" events to be ignorable. .TP \fB\-report_about\fR severity Set the threshhold for events to be reported. Events are the same as with -abort_on. Regardless what is set by -report_about, messages get always reported if they reach the severity threshhold of -abort_on . .TP > \fB\-overwrite\fR "on"|"off" Allow or disallow to overwrite existing files in the ISO image by files with the same user defined name. This is the RockRidge name and not the plain ISO name. .br With setting "off", RR name collisions cause SORRY-events. .TP .B Dialog mode control: .TP \fB\-dialog\fR "on"|"off" Enable or disable to enter dialog mode after all arguments are processed. In dialog mode input lines get prompted via readline or from stdin. .TP \fB\-page\fR len width Describe terminal to the text pager. .TP ? \fB\-use_readline\fR "on"|"off" If "on" then use readline for dialog. Else use plain stdin. .TP > \fB\-reassure\fR "on"|"off" If "on" then ask the user for "y" or "n" with any file before deleting or overwriting it in the ISO image. .TP .B Drive and media related inquiry actions: .TP \fB\-toc\fR Show media specific table of content. This is the media structure, not the ISO image directory tree. In case of overwriteable media holding a valid ISO image, a single session gets fabricated from the ISO image size info. .TP \fB\-devices\fR Show list of available MMC drives with the addresses of their libburn standard device files. .br This is only possible when no ISO image changes are pending. After this option was executed, there is no drive current and no image loaded. Eventually one has to aquire a drive again. .br In order to be visible a device has to offer rw-permissions with its libburn standard device file. Thus it might be only the .B superuser who is able to see all drives. .br Drives which are occupied by other processes get not shown. .TP \fB\-print-size\fR Print the foreseeable consumption of 2048 byte blocks by next -commit. This can last a while as a -commit gets prepared and only in last moment is revoked by this option. .TP \fB\-tell_media_space\fR Print available space on output media (minus already foreseeable consumption by next -commit.) .TP .B Navigation in ISO image and disk filesystem: .TP \fB\-cd\fR iso_rr_path Change the current working directory in the emerging ISO image as it is at the moment. .TP \fB\-cdx\fR disk_path Change the current working directory on filesystem. .TP \fB\-pwd\fR Tell the current working directory in the ISO image. .TP \fB\-pwdx\fR Tell the current working directory on local filesystem. .TP > \fB\-ls\fR pattern List files from the current working directory in the ISO image which match a shell pattern. (I.e. wildcards '*' '?') .TP > \fB\-lsx\fR pattern List files from the current working directory on local filesystem which match a shell pattern. (I.e. wildcards '*' '?') .TP > \fB\-ls_l\fR pattern Like -ls but also list some of the file attributes. .TP > \fB\-ls_lx\fR pattern Like -lsx but also list some of the file attributes. .TP > \fB\-find\fR pattern Equivalent to shell command find . -name pattern in the ISO image. .TP > \fB\-findx\fR pattern Equivalent to shell command find . -name pattern on filesystem. .TP .B Scripting, dialog and program control features: .TP \fB\-no_rc\fR Only if used as first command line argument this option prevents reading and interpretation of eventual startup files. See section FILES below. .TP \fB\-help\fR Print helptext. .TP \fB\-version\fR Print program name and version. .TP \fB\-history\fR textline Copy textline into libreadline history. .TP \fB\-status\fR [mode|filter] Print the current settings of xorriso. Modes: short... print only important or altered settings long ... print all settings including defaults long_history like long plus history lines .br Filters begin with '-' and are compared literally against the output lines of -status:long_history. A line is put out only if its start matches the filter text. No wildcards. .TP ? \fB\-status_history_max\fR number Set maximum number of history lines to be reported with -status "long_history". .TP \fB\-options_from_file\fR fileaddress Reads lines from fileaddress and executes them as dialog lines. .TP \fB\-print\fR text Print a text to result channel. .TP \fB\-prompt\fR text Show text at beginning of output line and wait for the user to hit the Enter key resp. to send a line via stdin. .TP \fB\-end\fR End program immediately .TP \fB#\fR any text In dialog or file execution mode only and only as first non-whitespace in line: Do not execute the line but eventually store it in history. .TP .B Support for frontend programs talking into stdin and listening at stdout: .TP \fB\-pkt_output\fR "on"|"off" Consolidate text output on stdout and classify each line by a channel indicator: .br 'R:' for result lines, 'I:' for notes and error messages, 'M:' for -mark texts. .TP \fB\-logfile\fR channel fileaddress Copy output of a channel to the given file. .TP \fB\-mark\fR text If text is not empty it will get put out each time an action has been completed. .TP \fB\-prog\fR text Use text as this program's name in subsequent messages .TP \fB\-prog_help\fR text Use text as this program's name and perform -help. .br .SH EXAMPLES >>> to come .br .SH FILES .SS .B Startup files: .br If not -no_rc is given as the first argument then xorriso attempts on startup to read and execute lines from the following files: /etc/default/xorriso /etc/opt/xorriso/rc /etc/xorriso/cdrskin.conf $HOME/.xorrisorc The files are read in the sequence given above, but none of them is required for xorriso to function properly. .br .SH SEE ALSO .TP For mounting xorriso generated ISO 9660 images .br .BR mount(8) .TP Other programs which produce ISO 9660 images .br .BR mkisofs(8), .BR genisoimage(8) .TP Other programs which burn images to optical media .BR growisofs(1), .BR cdrecord(1), .BR wodim(1), .BR cdrskin(1) .br .SH AUTHOR Thomas Schmitt .br for libburnia-project.org