dd command

$> dd [OPERAND]...

$> sudo dd bs=4M if=archlinux-2020.09.01-x86_64.iso of=/dev/sdb status=progress oflag=sync
708837376 bytes (709 MB, 676 MiB) copied, 101.529 s, 7.0 MB/s
169+1 records in
169+1 records out
711983104 bytes (712 MB, 679 MiB) copied, 101.957 s, 7.0 MB/s

$> tldr dd

  dd

  Convert and copy a file.

  - Make a bootable usb drive from an isohybrid file (such like archlinux-xxx.iso) and show the progress:
    dd if=file.iso of=/dev/usb_drive status=progress

  - Clone a drive to another drive with 4MB block, ignore error and show progress:
    dd if=/dev/source_drive of=/dev/dest_drive bs=4M conv=noerror status=progress

  - Generate a file of 100 random bytes by using kernel random driver:
    dd if=/dev/urandom of=random_file bs=100 count=1

  - Benchmark the write performance of a disk:
    dd if=/dev/zero of=file_1GB bs=1024 count=1000000

  - Check progress of an ongoing dd operation (Run this command from another shell):
    kill -USR1 $(pgrep ^dd)

$> dd --help
Usage: dd [OPERAND]...
  or:  dd OPTION
Copy a file, converting and formatting according to the operands.

  bs=BYTES        read and write up to BYTES bytes at a time
  cbs=BYTES       convert BYTES bytes at a time
  conv=CONVS      convert the file as per the comma separated symbol list
  count=N         copy only N input blocks
  ibs=BYTES       read up to BYTES bytes at a time (default: 512)
  if=FILE         read from FILE instead of stdin
  iflag=FLAGS     read as per the comma separated symbol list
  obs=BYTES       write BYTES bytes at a time (default: 512)
  of=FILE         write to FILE instead of stdout
  oflag=FLAGS     write as per the comma separated symbol list
  seek=N          skip N obs-sized blocks at start of output
  skip=N          skip N ibs-sized blocks at start of input
  status=LEVEL    The LEVEL of information to print to stderr;
                  'none' suppresses everything but error messages,
                  'noxfer' suppresses the final transfer statistics,
                  'progress' shows periodic transfer statistics

N and BYTES may be followed by the following multiplicative suffixes:
c =1, w =2, b =512, kB =1000, K =1024, MB =1000*1000, M =1024*1024, xM =M
GB =1000*1000*1000, G =1024*1024*1024, and so on for T, P, E, Z, Y.

Each CONV symbol may be:

  ascii     from EBCDIC to ASCII
  ebcdic    from ASCII to EBCDIC
  ibm       from ASCII to alternate EBCDIC
  block     pad newline-terminated records with spaces to cbs-size
  unblock   replace trailing spaces in cbs-size records with newline
  lcase     change upper case to lower case
  ucase     change lower case to upper case
  sparse    try to seek rather than write the output for NUL input blocks
  swab      swap every pair of input bytes
  sync      pad every input block with NULs to ibs-size; when used
            with block or unblock, pad with spaces rather than NULs
  excl      fail if the output file already exists
  nocreat   do not create the output file
  notrunc   do not truncate the output file
  noerror   continue after read errors
  fdatasync  physically write output file data before finishing
  fsync     likewise, but also write metadata

Each FLAG symbol may be:

  append    append mode (makes sense only for output; conv=notrunc suggested)
  direct    use direct I/O for data
  directory  fail unless a directory
  dsync     use synchronized I/O for data
  sync      likewise, but also for metadata
  fullblock  accumulate full blocks of input (iflag only)
  nonblock  use non-blocking I/O
  noatime   do not update access time
  nocache   Request to drop cache.  See also oflag=sync
  noctty    do not assign controlling terminal from file
  nofollow  do not follow symlinks
  count_bytes  treat 'count=N' as a byte count (iflag only)
  skip_bytes  treat 'skip=N' as a byte count (iflag only)
  seek_bytes  treat 'seek=N' as a byte count (oflag only)

Sending a USR1 signal to a running 'dd' process makes it
print I/O statistics to standard error and then resume copying.

Options are:

      --help     display this help and exit
      --version  output version information and exit

GNU coreutils online help: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
Full documentation at: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/dd>
or available locally via: info '(coreutils) dd invocation'