Best way to find os name and version in Unix/Linux platform

Question

I need to find the OS name and version on Unix/Linux platform. For this I tried following:

1. lsb_release utility

2. /etc/redha

Answer 1

This work fine for all Linux environment.

#!/bin/sh
cat /etc/*-release

In Ubuntu:

$ cat /etc/*-release
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=10.04
DISTRIB_CODENAME=lucid
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 10.04.4 LTS"

or 12.04:

$ cat /etc/*-release

DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=12.04
DISTRIB_CODENAME=precise
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 12.04.4 LTS"
NAME="Ubuntu"
VERSION="12.04.4 LTS, Precise Pangolin"
ID=ubuntu
ID_LIKE=debian
PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu precise (12.04.4 LTS)"
VERSION_ID="12.04"

In RHEL:

$ cat /etc/*-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 6.5 (Santiago)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 6.5 (Santiago)

Or Use this Script:

#!/bin/sh
# Detects which OS and if it is Linux then it will detect which Linux
# Distribution.

OS=`uname -s`
REV=`uname -r`
MACH=`uname -m`

GetVersionFromFile()
{
    VERSION=`cat $1 | tr "\n" ' ' | sed s/.*VERSION.*=\ // `
}

if [ "${OS}" = "SunOS" ] ; then
    OS=Solaris
    ARCH=`uname -p` 
    OSSTR="${OS} ${REV}(${ARCH} `uname -v`)"
elif [ "${OS}" = "AIX" ] ; then
    OSSTR="${OS} `oslevel` (`oslevel -r`)"
elif [ "${OS}" = "Linux" ] ; then
    KERNEL=`uname -r`
    if [ -f /etc/redhat-release ] ; then
        DIST='RedHat'
        PSUEDONAME=`cat /etc/redhat-release | sed s/.*\(// | sed s/\)//`
        REV=`cat /etc/redhat-release | sed s/.*release\ // | sed s/\ .*//`
    elif [ -f /etc/SuSE-release ] ; then
        DIST=`cat /etc/SuSE-release | tr "\n" ' '| sed s/VERSION.*//`
        REV=`cat /etc/SuSE-release | tr "\n" ' ' | sed s/.*=\ //`
    elif [ -f /etc/mandrake-release ] ; then
        DIST='Mandrake'
        PSUEDONAME=`cat /etc/mandrake-release | sed s/.*\(// | sed s/\)//`
        REV=`cat /etc/mandrake-release | sed s/.*release\ // | sed s/\ .*//`
    elif [ -f /etc/debian_version ] ; then
        DIST="Debian `cat /etc/debian_version`"
        REV=""

    fi
    if [ -f /etc/UnitedLinux-release ] ; then
        DIST="${DIST}[`cat /etc/UnitedLinux-release | tr "\n" ' ' | sed s/VERSION.*//`]"
    fi

    OSSTR="${OS} ${DIST} ${REV}(${PSUEDONAME} ${KERNEL} ${MACH})"

fi

echo ${OSSTR}

Answer 2

With perl and Linux::Distribution, the cleanest solution for an old problem :

#!/bin/sh

perl -e '
    use Linux::Distribution qw(distribution_name distribution_version);

    my $linux = Linux::Distribution->new;
    if(my $distro = $linux->distribution_name()) {
          my $version = $linux->distribution_version();
          print "you are running $distro";
          print " version $version" if $version;
          print "\n";
    } else {
          print "distribution unknown\n";
    }
'

Answer 3

The "lsb_release" command provides certain Linux Standard Base and distribution-specific information. So using the below command we can get Operating system name and operating system version.

"lsb_release -a"

Answer 4

I prepared following commands to find concise information about a Linux system:

clear
echo "\n----------OS Information------------"
hostnamectl | grep "Static hostname:"
hostnamectl | tail -n 3
echo "\n----------Memory Information------------"
cat /proc/meminfo | grep MemTotal
echo "\n----------CPU Information------------"
echo -n "Number of core(s): "
cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep "processor" | wc -l
cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep "model name" | head -n 1
echo "\n----------Disk Information------------"
echo -n "Total Size: "
df -h --total | tail -n 1| awk '{print $2}'
echo -n "Used: "
df -h --total | tail -n 1| awk '{print $3}'
echo -n "Available: "
df -h --total | tail -n 1| awk '{print $4}'
echo "\n-------------------------------------\n"

Copy and paste in an sh file like info.sh and then run it using command sh info.sh

Answer 5

Following command worked out for me nicely. It gives you the OS name and version.

lsb_release -a

Answer 6

With quotes:

cat /etc/*-release | grep "PRETTY_NAME" | sed 's/PRETTY_NAME=//g'

gives output as:

"CentOS Linux 7 (Core)"

Without quotes:

cat /etc/*-release | grep "PRETTY_NAME" | sed 's/PRETTY_NAME=//g' | sed 's/"//g'

gives output as:

CentOS Linux 7 (Core)