watched_filename EVENT_NAMES event_filename

watched_filename

is the name of the file on which the event occurred. If the file is a directory, a trailing slash is output.

EVENT_NAMES

are the names of the inotify events which occurred, separated by commas.

event_filename

is output only when the event occurred on a directory, and in this case the name of the file within the directory which caused this event is output.

By default, any special characters in filenames are not escaped in any way. This can make the output of inotifywait difficult to parse in awk scripts or similar. The --csv and --format options will be helpful in this case.

-h, --help

Output some helpful usage information.

-m, --monitor

Instead of exiting after receiving a single event, execute indefinitely. The default behaviour is to exit after the first event occurs.

-r, --recursive

Watch all subdirectories of any directories passed as arguments. Watches will be set up recursively to an unlimited depth. Symbolic links are not traversed. Newly created subdirectories will also be watched.

Warning: If you use this option while watching the root directory of a large tree, it may take quite a while until all inotify watches are established, and events will not be received in this time. Also, since one inotify watch will be established per subdirectory, it is possible that the maximum amount of inotify watches per user will be reached. The default maximum is 8192; it can be increased by writing to /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches.

-q, --quiet

If specified once, the program will be less verbose. Specifically, it will not state when it has completed establishing all inotify watches.

If specified twice, the program will output nothing at all, except in the case of fatal errors.

-t <seconds>, --timeout <seconds>

Listen for an event for the specified amount of seconds, exiting if an event has not occurred in that time.

-e <event>, --event <event>

Listen for specific event(s) only. The events which can be listened for are listed in the EVENTS section. This option can be specified more than once. If omitted, all events are listened for.

-c, --csv

Output in CSV (comma-separated values) format. This is useful when filenames may contain spaces, since in this case it is not safe to simply split the output at each space character.

--format <fmt>

Output in a user-specified format, using printf-like syntax. The event strings output are limited to around 4000 characters and will be truncated to this length. The following conversions are supported:

%w

This will be replaced with the name of the Watched file on which an event occurred.

%f

When an event occurs within a directory, this will be replaced with the name of the File which caused the event to occur. Otherwise, this will be replaced with an empty string.

%e

Replaced with the Event(s) which occurred, comma-separated.

%Xe

Replaced with the Event(s) which occurred, separated by whichever character is in the place of `X'.

0

The program executed successfully, and an event occurred which was being listened for.

1

An error occurred in execution of the program, or an event occurred which was not being listened for. The latter generally occurs if something happens which forcibly removes the inotify watch, such as a watched file being deleted or the filesystem containing a watched file being unmounted.

2

The -t option was used and an event did not occur in the specified interval of time.

access

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was read from.

modify

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was written to.

attrib

The metadata of a watched file or a file within a watched directory was modified. This includes timestamps, file permissions, extended attributes etc.

close_write

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was closed, after being opened in writeable mode. This does not necessarily imply the file was written to.

close_nowrite

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was closed, after being opened in read-only mode.

close

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was closed, regardless of how it was opened. Note that this is actually implemented simply by listening for both close_write and close_nowrite, hence all close events received will be output as one of these, not CLOSE.

open

A watched file or a file within a watched directory was opened.

moved_to

A file or directory was moved into a watched directory. This event occurs even if the file is simply moved from and to the same directory.

moved_from

A file or directory was moved from a watched directory. This event occurs even if the file is simply moved from and to the same directory.

move

A file or directory was moved from or to a watched directory. Note that this is actually implemented simply by listening for both moved_to and moved_from, hence all close events received will be output as one or both of these, not MOVE.

create

A file or directory was created within a watched directory.

delete

A file or directory within a watched directory was deleted.

delete_self

A watched file or directory was deleted. After this event the file or directory is no longer being watched. Note that this event can occur even if it is not explicitly being listened for.

unmount

The filesystem on which a watched file or directory resides was unmounted. After this event the file or directory is no longer being watched. Note that this event can occur even if it is not explicitly being listened to.

% inotifywait test
Setting up watches.
Watches established.
test/ ACCESS foo

#!/bin/sh
while inotifywait -e modify /var/log/messages; do
  if tail -n1 /var/log/messages | grep httpd; then
    kdialog --msgbox "Apache needs love!"
  fi
done

% inotifywait -m -r --format '%:e %f' ~/test
Setting up watches.  Beware: since -r was given, this may take a while!
Watches established.
CREATE badfile
OPEN badfile
ATTRIB badfile
CLOSE_WRITE:CLOSE badfile
CREATE goodfile
OPEN goodfile
ATTRIB goodfile
CLOSE_WRITE:CLOSE goodfile
DELETE badfile

It is assumed the inotify event queue will never overflow.

inotifywait is part of inotify-tools. The inotify-tools website is located at: