Linux Pocket Guide

Name

sync — coreutils

Synopsis

/bin stdin stdout - file -- opt --help --version

The sync command flushes all disk caches to disk. Usually, the kernel may buffer reads, writes, inode changes, and other disk-related activity in memory. sync writes the changes to disk. Normally, you don’t need to run this command, but if (say) you’re about to do something risky that might crash your machine, running sync immediately beforehand can’t hurt.