DEPMOD.D(5)

✨ DEPMOD.D(5) ✨

okay bestie, this is the manual page for depmod.d — the config directory situation for depmod. yes it's a section 5 page, yes it lives in depmod.d, and yes we're gonna go through the WHOLE thing together 💖

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🌸 NAME 🌸

depmod.d — Configuration directory for depmod

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🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

/etc/depmod.d/*.conf

/run/depmod.d/*.conf

/usr/local/lib/depmod.d/*.conf

/usr/lib/depmod.d/*.conf

/lib/depmod.d/*.conf

like. those are the spots. all of them. the whole girlies list 💅

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so when depmod runs, the very first thing it does is go read the config files from those locations up there ^^^ and based on that it processes the available modules and their dependencies. it's giving main character energy for your module search path, fr fr.

for example: you can change the search order, exclude folders, override a specific module's location and more. so many levers to pull, we're obsessed ✨

this is typically useful in cases where built-in kernel modules are complemented by custom built versions of the same, and the user wishes to affect the priority of processing in order to override the module version supplied by the kernel. iykyk — you built your own version, now you want it to actually win the vibe check instead of the kernel's default one 👑

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💜 CONFIGURATION FORMAT 💜

the configuration files contain one command per line, with blank lines and lines starting with # ignored (super useful for adding comments, do it, annotate your life 🍓).

a \ at the end of a line causes it to continue on the next line, which makes the files a bit neater. yes bestie, backslash line continuation, we love a tidy config 🌈

see the COMMANDS section below for more.

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🧚 CONFIGURATION DIRECTORIES AND PRECEDENCE 🧚

configuration files are read from the directories listed in SYNOPSIS in that order of precedence. once a file of a given filename is loaded, any file of the same name in subsequent directories is ignored — first one in wins, no takebacks 💀

all configuration files are sorted in lexicographic order, regardless of the directory they reside in.

configuration files can either be:

• completely replaced — by having a new configuration file with the same name in a directory of higher priority
• partially replaced — by having a configuration file that is ordered later

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👑 COMMANDS 👑

🌟 search subdirectory...

this allows you to specify the order in which /lib/modules (or other configured module location) subdirectories will be processed by depmod.

directories are listed in order, with the highest priority given to the first listed directory and the lowest priority given to the last directory listed.

• the special keyword built-in refers to the standard module directories installed by the kernel
• another special keyword external refers to the list of external directories, defined by the external command

by default, depmod will give a higher priority to a directory with the name updates using this built-in search string: "updates built-in" — but more complex arrangements are possible and are used in several popular distributions. so you can go wild with it, no pressure 🫶

🌟 override modulename kernelversion modulesubdirectory

this command allows you to override which version of a specific module will be used when more than one module sharing the same name is processed by the depmod command.

it is possible to specify one kernel or all kernels using the * wildcard. modulesubdirectory is the name of the subdirectory under /lib/modules (or other module location) where the target module is installed.

for example, it is possible to override the priority of an updated test module called kmod by specifying the following command:

override kmod * extra

this will ensure that any matching module name installed under the extra subdirectory within /lib/modules (or other module location) will take priority over any likenamed module already provided by the kernel. ate and left zero crumbs 🔥

🌟 external kernelversion absolutemodulesdirectory...

this specifies a list of directories, which will be checked according to the priorities in the search command. the order matters also — the first directory has the higher priority.

the kernelversion is a POSIX regular expression or * wildcard, like in the override. periodt 💅

🌟 exclude excludedir

this specifies the trailing directories that will be excluded during the search for kernel modules.

the excludedir is the trailing directory to exclude.

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🌈 COPYRIGHT 🌈

this manual page Copyright 2006-2010, Jon Masters, Red Hat, Inc.

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⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

• depmod(8)

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🙈 BUGS 🙈

please direct any bug reports to kmod's issue tracker at https://github.com/kmod-project/kmod/issues/ alongside with:

• version used
• steps to reproduce the problem
• the expected outcome

give them the full receipt bestie, it's the only way they can fix it 😭

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💖 AUTHORS 💖

numerous contributions have come from the linux-modules mailing list <linux-modules@vger.kernel.org> and Github. if you have a clone of kmod.git itself, the output of git-shortlog(1) and git-blame(1) can show you the authors for specific parts of the project. detective work but make it git 🔍

Lucas De Marchi <lucas.de.marchi@gmail.com> is the current maintainer of the project.

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and that's the whole page, bestie. all of it. no skips, no summaries, every flag accounted for 💅✨

sign-off time: this little beauty comes from kmod, dated 2026-10-30. go forth and configure your depmod.d with main character energy, you absolute icon 🎀🦋