4.1. Console and Commands
Overview
Karaf provides a powerful console and a set of commands that can be used to perform various tasks. Commands can be located in the root shell or in a sub-shell. A sub-shell is a group of related commands, like commands related to the OSGi framework or the log system.
The following shells are available out-of-the-box, but the console can be easily extended:
Root shell
help
The help method is one of the most usefull method to get you started. Without any parameters, the command will display the list of available commands.
You can also access the help from a subshell by launching help osgi for example.
You can access the help from a command by launching help clear or for a sub-shell command: help osgi/list or osgi/list --help.
exit
If ran from the local console, Karaf will be stopped. If ran from a remote console, the remote shell will be terminated, but the Karaf remote instance will not be terminated.
..
When inside a subshell, the .. command will exit this subshell and go back to the parent shell.
For example:
s...@root:/> log
s...@root:log> help
Available commands:
display Display log entries.
display-exception Display the last exception from the log.
get Show log level.
set Set log level.
d Link to: log/display
de Link to: log/display-exception
s...@root:log> ..
s...@root:/>
info
This command displays a bunch of information relative to the Karaf and the JVM. These informations are also available from the JMX console included in the JRE.
Admin shell
Features shell
The features shell contains a few commands to provision entire applications easily.
More information is available on the chapter 4.6. Provisioning.
Log shell
The log shell contains a few commands to display the log entries, retrieve or change the log levels:
s...@root:/> help log
display Display log entries.
display-exception Display the last exception from the log.
get Show log level.
set Set log level.
d Link to: log/display
de Link to: log/display-exception
See the documentation on the logging system for more informations.
OBR shell
OBR (OSGi Bundle Repository![]()
) is a proposed specification that defines an xml format for repositories of OSGi bundles and an associated service to access it. Karaf proposes a number of commands that can be used to deal with such repositories.
Note that this feature is not installed by default. To install it, you must run the following command:
s...@root:/> features/install obr
servicemix> help obr
Available commands in obr:
addUrl Add a list of repository URLs to the repository service
deploy Deploy
info Display the meta-data for the specified bundles.
list List
listUrl Display the repository URLs currently associated with the repository service.
removeUrl Remove a list of repository URLs from the repository service
source Source
start Start
OSGi shell
The OSGi sub-shell provides commands for managing the OSGi framework: listing OSGi bundles, services, managing bundle lifecycles.
Look at the online help (launch osgi help command) for more informations.
s...@root:/> help osgi
Available commands in osgi:
bundle-level Get or set the start level of a given bundle
headers Display headers
install Install bundle
list List bundles
ls List services
refresh Refresh bundle
update Update bundle
resolve Resolve bundle
shutdown Shutdown
start Start bundle
start-level Get or set the start level
stop Stop bundle
uninstall Uninstall bundle
Remote shell
Standard commands
Examples:
cat mvn:org.apache.servicemix/servicemix/3.2.1/pom
or
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