is used to check the ext2/ext3/ext4 family of file systems.
For ext3 and ext4 file systems that use a journal, if the system has been
shut down uncleanly without any errors, normally, after replaying the
-committed transactions in the journal, the file system should be
-marked as clean. Hence, for file systems that use journaling,
+committed transactions in the journal, the file system should be
+marked as clean.
+Hence, for file systems that use journaling,
.B e2fsck
will normally replay the journal and exit, unless its superblock
indicates that further checking is required.
.BR \-c ,
.BR \-l ,
or
-.B -L
+.B \-L
options are
.I not
-specified. However, even if it is safe to do so, the results printed by
+specified.
+However, even if it is safe to do so, the results printed by
.B e2fsck
-are not valid if the file system is mounted. If
+are not valid if the file system is mounted.
+If
.B e2fsck
asks whether or not you should check a file system which is mounted,
the only correct answer is ``no''. Only experts who really know what
.BR \-y ,
.BR \-n ,
or
-.BR \-p
+.B \-p
are specified), the program will ask the user to fix each problem found in the
-file system. A response of 'y' will fix the error; 'n' will leave the error
-unfixed; and 'a' will fix the problem and all subsequent problems; pressing
+file system. A response of \&'y' will fix the error; \&'n' will leave the error
+unfixed; and \&'a' will fix the problem and all subsequent problems; pressing
Enter will proceed with the default response, which is printed before the
question mark. Pressing Control-C terminates e2fsck immediately.
.SH OPTIONS
option to print out where the superblocks exist, supposing
.B mke2fs
is supplied with arguments that are consistent with the file system's layout
-(e.g. blocksize, blocks per group,
+(e.g.\& blocksize, blocks per group,
.BR sparse_super ,
etc.).
.IP
.B \-D
Optimize directories in file system. This option causes e2fsck to
try to optimize all directories, either by re-indexing them if the
-file system supports directory indexing, or by sorting and compressing
+file system supports directory indexing, or by sorting and compressing
directories for smaller directories, or for file systems using
traditional linear directories.
.IP
will require while checking the file system. The version number may
be 1 or 2. The default extended attribute version format is 2.
.TP
-.BI journal_only
+.B journal_only
Only replay the journal if required, but do not perform any further checks
or repairs.
.TP
-.BI fragcheck
+.B fragcheck
During pass 1, print a detailed report of any discontiguous blocks for
files in the file system.
.TP
-.BI discard
+.B discard
Attempt to discard free blocks and unused inode blocks after the full
file system check (discarding blocks is useful on solid state devices and sparse
-/ thin-provisioned storage). Note that discard is done in pass 5 AFTER the
+/ thin-provisioned storage).
+Note that discard is done in pass 5 AFTER the
file system has been fully checked and only if it does not contain recognizable
-errors. However there might be cases where
+errors.
+However there might be cases where
.B e2fsck
does not fully recognize a problem and hence in this case this
option may prevent you from further manual data recovery.
.TP
-.BI nodiscard
-Do not attempt to discard free blocks and unused inode blocks. This option is
-exactly the opposite of discard option. This is set as default.
+.B nodiscard
+Do not attempt to discard free blocks and unused inode blocks.
+This option is exactly the opposite of discard option.
+This is set as default.
.TP
-.BI no_optimize_extents
+.B no_optimize_extents
Do not offer to optimize the extent tree by eliminating unnecessary
width or depth. This can also be enabled in the options section of
.BR /etc/e2fsck.conf .
.TP
-.BI optimize_extents
+.B optimize_extents
Offer to optimize the extent tree by eliminating unnecessary
width or depth. This is the default unless otherwise specified in
.BR /etc/e2fsck.conf .
.TP
-.BI inode_count_fullmap
+.B inode_count_fullmap
Trade off using memory for speed when checking a file system with a
large number of hard-linked files. The amount of memory required is
proportional to the number of inodes in the file system. For large file
-systems, this can be gigabytes of memory. (For example, a 40TB file system
+systems, this can be gigabytes of memory. (For example, a 40\ TB file system
with 2.8 billion inodes will consume an additional 5.7 GB memory if this
optimization is enabled.) This optimization can also be enabled in the
options section of
.BR /etc/e2fsck.conf .
.TP
-.BI no_inode_count_fullmap
+.B no_inode_count_fullmap
Disable the
.B inode_count_fullmap
optimization. This is the default unless otherwise specified in
.BR /etc/e2fsck.conf .
.TP
-.BI readahead_kb
+.B readahead_kb
Use this many KiB of memory to pre-fetch metadata in the hopes of reducing
e2fsck runtime. By default, this is set to the size of two block groups' inode
-tables (typically 4MiB on a regular ext4 file system); if this amount is more
+tables (typically 4\ MiB on a regular ext4 file system); if this amount is more
than 1/50th of total physical memory, readahead is disabled. Set this to zero
to disable readahead entirely.
.TP
-.BI bmap2extent
+.B bmap2extent
Convert block-mapped files to extent-mapped files.
.TP
-.BI fixes_only
+.B fixes_only
Only fix damaged metadata; do not optimize htree directories or compress
-extent trees. This option is incompatible with the -D and -E bmap2extent
+extent trees. This option is incompatible with the \-D and \-E bmap2extent
options.
.TP
-.BI check_encoding
+.B check_encoding
Force verification of encoded filenames in case-insensitive directories.
This is the default mode if the file system has the strict flag enabled.
.TP
-.BI unshare_blocks
+.B unshare_blocks
If the file system has shared blocks, with the shared blocks read-only feature
enabled, then this will unshare all shared blocks and unset the read-only
-feature bit. If there is not enough free space then the operation will fail.
+feature bit.
+If there is not enough free space then the operation will fail.
If the file system does not have the read-only feature bit, but has shared
-blocks anyway, then this option will have no effect. Note when using this
+blocks anyway, then this option will have no effect.
+Note when using this
option, if there is no free space to clone blocks, there is no prompt to
delete files and instead the operation will fail.
.IP
-Note that unshare_blocks implies the "-f" option to ensure that all passes
-are run. Additionally, if "-n" is also specified, e2fsck will simulate trying
-to allocate enough space to deduplicate. If this fails, the exit code will
-be non-zero.
+Note that unshare_blocks implies the "\-f" option to ensure that all passes
+are run.
+Additionally, if "\-n" is also specified, e2fsck will simulate trying
+to allocate enough space to deduplicate.
+If this fails, the exit code will be non-zero.
.RE
.TP
.B \-f
@JDEV@Set the pathname where the external-journal for this file system can be
@JDEV@found.
.TP
-.BI \-k
+.B \-k
When combined with the
.B \-c
option, any existing bad blocks in the bad blocks list are preserved,
.BR badblocks (8)
must be given the blocksize of the file system in order to obtain correct
results. As a result, it is much simpler and safer to use the
-.B -c
+.B \-c
option to
.BR e2fsck ,
since it will assure that the correct parameters are passed to the
.TP
.BI \-z " undo_file"
Before overwriting a file system block, write the old contents of the block to
-an undo file. This undo file can be used with e2undo(8) to restore the old
+an undo file. This undo file can be used with
+.BR e2undo (8)
+to restore the old
contents of the file system should something go wrong. If the empty string is
passed as the undo_file argument, the undo file will be written to a file named
e2fsck-\fIdevice\fR.e2undo in the directory specified via the
.B e2fsck
is the sum of the following conditions:
.br
-\ 0\ \-\ No errors
-.br
-\ 1\ \-\ File system errors corrected
+ 0 \-\ No errors
.br
-\ 2\ \-\ File system errors corrected, system should
+ 1 \-\ File system errors corrected
.br
-\ \ \ \ be rebooted
+ 2 \-\ File system errors corrected, system should
.br
-\ 4\ \-\ File system errors left uncorrected
+ \ \ be rebooted
.br
-\ 8\ \-\ Operational error
+ 4 \-\ File system errors left uncorrected
.br
-\ 16\ \-\ Usage or syntax error
+ 8 \-\ Operational error
.br
-\ 32\ \-\ E2fsck canceled by user request
+ 16 \-\ Usage or syntax error
.br
-\ 128\ \-\ Shared library error
+ 32 \-\ E2fsck canceled by user request
.br
+ 128 \-\ Shared library error
.SH SIGNALS
The following signals have the following effect when sent to
.BR e2fsck .
are in English; if your system has been
configured so that
.BR e2fsck 's
-messages have been translated into another language, please set the the
+messages have been translated into another language, please set the
.B LC_ALL
environment variable to
.B C
displays when it is run, so I know which version you are running.
.SH ENVIRONMENT
.TP
-.BI E2FSCK_CONFIG
+.B E2FSCK_CONFIG
Determines the location of the configuration file (see
.BR e2fsck.conf (5)).
.SH AUTHOR