switch_root - Man Page

• Move /proc, /dev, /sys and /run to the specified filesystem, use this filesystem as the new root and start the specified init process: switch_root new_root /sbin/init
• Display help: switch_root -h

tldr.sh

switch_root [-hV]

switch_root newroot init [arg...]

switch_root moves already mounted /proc, /dev, /sys and /run to newroot and makes newroot the new root filesystem and starts init process.

WARNING: switch_root removes recursively all files and directories on the current root filesystem.

-h,  --help

Display help text and exit.

-V,  --version

Print version and exit.

switch_root returns 1 on failure, it never returns on success.

switch_root will fail to function if newroot is not the root of a mount. If you want to switch root into a directory that does not meet this requirement then you can first use a bind-mounting trick to turn any directory into a mount point:

mount --bind $DIR $DIR

Peter Jones, Jeremy Katz, Karel Zak

chroot(2), init(8), mkinitrd(8), mount(8)

For bug reports, use the issue tracker at https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues.

The switch_root command is part of the util-linux package which can be downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive.

chroot(2), namespaces(7), pid_namespaces(7), pivot_root(2), pivot_root(8).