Bash and Hardware Information

If you’re a coder who works with Linux-based systems, it is important to know how to retrieve hardware information using Bash. This can be useful for a variety of tasks, such as troubleshooting, inventory management, and system optimization. In this article, we’ll cover the basic commands and tools that you can use to gather hardware information using Bash.

lshw

One of the most powerful tools for getting hardware information in Linux is lshw. This command-line utility provides detailed information about all the hardware components on your system. To use it, simply open a terminal and type sudo lshw. You’ll need to use sudo because lshw requires root privileges to access all the hardware details.

sudo lshw

This command will provide a comprehensive list of all your hardware components, including the system’s CPU, memory, disk drives, network adapters, and more. If you want to see a specific category of hardware, you can use the -C option followed by the category name. For example, to see information about your system’s memory, you would enter:

sudo lshw -C memory

If you want to save this information to a file, you can redirect the output using the > operator. For example:

sudo lshw > hardware-info.txt

lsusb

Another useful command for getting hardware information is lsusb. This command lists all USB devices connected to your system. To use it, simply type lsusb in the terminal:

lsusb

You’ll see a list of all USB devices, including details about their vendor ID, product ID, and more. If you want more detailed information, you can use the -v option to get verbose output:

lsusb -v

This will provide a thorough breakdown of each USB device’s specifications and capabilities.

To wrap it up, Bash provides powerful commands like lshw and lsusb for retrieving hardware information on Linux-based systems. These tools are invaluable for coders who need to manage or troubleshoot hardware on their systems. With just a few simple commands, you can gather all the details you need about your computer’s hardware configuration.