UMBCTL(8)

💅 UMBCTL — the cellular modem glow-up page (man 8) 💅

okay so bestie, welcome to umbctl(8) from the System Manager's Manual — this is the little tool that displays or sets MBIM cellular modem interface parameters (4G/LTE). yes. your modem. your 4G/LTE. your main character networking moment. let's go 🦋

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

umbctl [-v] ifname [parameter [value]] ...
umbctl [-v] -f config-file ifname

literally that's it. two whole shapes of the command. slay 💅

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

okay so umbctl supports the following options:

• -f config-file — parses config-file for parameter[=value] pairs, one per line, as if they had been specified on the command line. it's giving "let me not put my secrets on display" energy: this is how you avoid passing the password or PIN codes as command line arguments. comments starting with # to the end of the current line are ignored — so go off, annotate your heart out 🎀
• -v — enables verbose mode. she's chatty. we love her.

so here's the tea 🍓: the umb(4) driver may require a number of additional arguments or optional parameters besides the settings that can be adjusted with ifconfig(8). these may be credentials or other tunable connectivity variables. that's literally what umbctl is for — displaying the current settings, or adjusting these parameters as required. no cap.

for whatever intent umbctl is being called, at least the parameter ifname needs to be specified — that's the name of the interface for which the settings are to be performed or displayed. not optional, bestie. it's the whole point. use ifconfig(8) or netstat(1) to see which interfaces are available 👑

if no other parameter is given, umbctl will just list the current status for ifname and exit. casual. lowkey. a little vibe check and she's gone 💨

if any additional parameter is supplied, superuser privileges are required, and the command works in ‘set’ mode. this is normally done quietly, unless the option -v is also enabled — which will cause a final printout of the status as described above once all other actions have been taken. so like, she does the thing, and then she shows you the receipts ✨

the parameters currently supported include:

• apn=access-point — set the APN to access-point.
• username=username — set the username to username.
• password=password — set the password to password.
• pin=pin-code — enter the PIN pin-code.
• puk=puk-code — enter the PUK puk-code.
• roaming — allow data connections when roaming. she travels ✈️
• -roaming — deny data connections when roaming. she stays home 🏠

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🎀 EXAMPLES 🎀

display the settings for umb0:

# umbctl umb0
umb0: state up, mode automatic, registration home network
        provider "BSD-Net", dataclass LTE, signal good
        phone number "+15554242", roaming "" (denied)
        APN "", TX 50000000, RX 100000000
        firmware "MBIM_FW_V1.0", hardware "MBIM_HW_V1.0"

look at her. state up. signal good. phone number "+15554242". firmware "MBIM_FW_V1.0", hardware "MBIM_HW_V1.0". iconic, honestly 😭💖

configure the connection parameters for umb0 from the command line:

# umbctl umb0 apn operator.internet username mobile password mobile

configure the connection parameters for umb0 from a file:

# umbctl -f /dev/stdin umb0 << EOF
pin=1234
EOF

see how the PIN never touches your shell history like that? that's the -f serve 🫶

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🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

netstat(1), umb(4), ifconfig(8) — go read them, they're literally her friends 🌈

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💜 HISTORY 💜

the umbctl utility first appeared in NetBSD 9.0, and FreeBSD 15.0. a whole era 👑

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🌟 AUTHORS 🌟

the program was written by Pierre Pronchery. thank you king 🙏

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ngl this page is from the Debian build, dated December 20, 2024 — that's the footer tea, bestie. now go forth and configure your modem 💅✨🎀