MD5SUM(1)

📦
version 9.4 · 5 versions
, in ubuntu noble

✨ md5sum(1) — the manual page, but make it make sense ✨

okay bestie, welcome to the md5sum manual page (section 1 of the manual, user commands, the iconic-est corner of the man pages 💅). this is the one that makes checksums. sit down, hydrate, let's go 🫶

🌸 NAME 🌸

md5sum — compute and check MD5 message digest ✨

like. it does the math on your files and gives you a little fingerprint back. that's the whole vibe.

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

md5sum [OPTION]... [FILE]...

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Print or check MD5 (128-bit) checksums.

With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input. (the dash is giving "read from stdin, bestie" 🥤)

  • -b, --binary — read in binary mode
  • -c, --check — read checksums from the FILEs and check them 👀
  • --tag — create a BSD-style checksum
  • -t, --text — read in text mode (this one is the default, she's the baseline 🧚)
  • -z, --zero — end each output line with NUL, not newline, and disable file name escaping
  • --help — display this help and exit
  • --version — output version information and exit

💖 The following five options are useful only when verifying checksums 💖

  • --ignore-missing — don't fail or report status for missing files 🙈
  • --quiet — don't print OK for each successfully verified file 🤫
  • --status — don't output anything, status code shows success
  • --strict — exit non-zero for improperly formatted checksum lines 😤
  • -w, --warn — warn about improperly formatted checksum lines 🚨

The sums are computed as described in RFC 1321. When checking, the input should be a former output of this program. The default mode is to print a line with: checksum, a space, a character indicating input mode ('*' for binary, ' ' for text or where binary is insignificant), and name for each FILE.

Note: There is no difference between binary mode and text mode on GNU systems. (so like, on GNU they're literally the same, no drama, periodt)

💀 BUGS 💀

Do not use the MD5 algorithm for security related purposes. Instead, use an SHA-2 algorithm, implemented in the programs sha224sum(1), sha256sum(1), sha384sum(1), sha512sum(1), or the BLAKE2 algorithm, implemented in b2sum(1).

bestie I am BEGGING you. MD5 for security is not the move. use SHA-2 or BLAKE2. this is not a drill, this is the manual telling you directly 🚩

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Written by Ulrich Drepper, Scott Miller, and David Madore. (legends, no cap 🫡)

🌈 REPORTING BUGS 🌈

GNU coreutils online help: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>

Report any translation bugs to <https://translationproject.org/team/>

Copyright © 2023 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.

This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.

There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/md5sum> or available locally via: info '(coreutils) md5sum invocation'

and that's the whole page, bestie 🎀 this was GNU coreutils 9.4, dated August 2026, and it ate. go hash something. mwah 💅✨🦋

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