busctl(1)
Introspect and interact with D-Bus message bus system and services.
Synopsis
busctl [OPTIONS...] COMMAND [NAME...]Description
busctl is a utility for introspecting and interacting with D-Bus, the system and session message buses used by systemd and many Linux services. It allows you to list services, objects, interfaces, and methods; call methods; get/set properties; and monitor bus activity.
D-Bus is an inter-process communication (IPC) system that enables applications to communicate with each other and the system. busctl provides command-line access to this functionality without needing to write code.
Common options
| Flag | What it does |
|---|---|
-s, --system | Connect to the system message bus (default) |
-u, --user | Connect to the user (session) message bus |
-H, --host=HOST | Connect to bus on remote host via SSH |
--no-pager | Do not pipe output into a pager |
-j, --json=SHORT|PRETTY|OFF | Output results as JSON instead of formatted text |
--verbose | Show detailed output with additional information |
-q, --quiet | Suppress output |
--address=ADDRESS | Connect to D-Bus at the given address instead of system/user bus |
Examples
List all services currently available on the system message bus
busctl listShow all interfaces, methods, properties, and signals for systemd's main object
busctl introspect org.freedesktop.systemd1 /org/freedesktop/systemd1Display the entire object tree for the systemd service
busctl tree org.freedesktop.systemd1Call the GetUnit method to retrieve the path for a service object
busctl call org.freedesktop.systemd1 /org/freedesktop/systemd1 org.freedesktop.systemd1.Manager GetUnit s test.serviceGet the Version property from systemd's manager interface
busctl get-property org.freedesktop.systemd1 /org/freedesktop/systemd1 org.freedesktop.systemd1.Manager VersionSet a boolean property on a D-Bus object
busctl set-property org.freedesktop.DBus /org/freedesktop/DBus org.freedesktop.DBus.Properties TimedOut b trueMonitor all messages to and from the specified service in real-time
busctl monitor org.freedesktop.systemd1Introspect the notification service on the user (session) message bus
busctl -u introspect org.freedesktop.Notifications /org/freedesktop/Notifications