Facter: CLI

NOTE: This page was generated from the OpenFact source code based on version 5.6.1 on 2026-06-10 16:32:38 +0000. Do not edit it here; fix it upstream.

NAME

facter - collect and display facts about the current system

SYNOPSIS

facter [options] [query …]
facter --version
facter --list-block-groups
facter --list-cache-groups
facter --help

DESCRIPTION

facter is a command-line tool that gathers basic facts about nodes (systems) such as hardware details, network settings, OS type and version, and more. These facts are made available as variables in your Puppet manifests and can be used to inform conditional expressions in Puppet.

If no queries are given, then all facts will be returned.

Many of the command line options can also be set via the HOCON config file. This file can also be used to block or cache certain fact groups.

OPTIONS

--color

Enable color output.

--no-color

Disable color output.

-c, --config=‌value

The location of the config file.

--custom-dir=‌value

A directory to use for custom facts.

-d, --debug

Enable debug output.

--external-dir=‌value

A directory to use for external facts.

--hocon

Output in Hocon format.

-j, --json

Output in JSON format.

-l, --log-level=‌value

Set logging level. Supported levels are: none, trace, debug, info, warn, error, and fatal.

--no-block

Disable fact blocking.

--no-cache

Disable loading and refreshing facts from the cache

--no-custom-facts

Disable custom facts.

--no-external-facts

Disable external facts.

--no-ruby

Disable loading Ruby, facts requiring Ruby, and custom facts.

--trace

Enable backtraces for custom facts.

--verbose

Enable verbose (info) output.

--show-legacy

Show legacy facts when querying all facts.

-y, --yaml

Output in YAML format.

--strict

Enable more aggressive error reporting.

-t, --timing

Show how much time it took to resolve each fact

--sequential

Resolve facts sequentially

--http-debug

Whether to write HTTP request and responses to stderr. This should never be used in production.

-p, --puppet

Load the Puppet libraries, thus allowing Facter to load Puppet-specific facts.

FILES

/etc/puppetlabs/facter/facter.conf

A HOCON config file that can be used to specify directories for custom and external facts, set various command line options, and specify facts to block. See example below for details, or visit the [GitHub README](https://github.com/puppetlabs/puppetlabs-hocon#overview).

EXAMPLES

Display all facts:

$ facter
disks => {
  sda => {
    model => "Virtual disk",
    size => "8.00 GiB",
    size_bytes => 8589934592,
    vendor => "ExampleVendor"
  }
}
dmi => {
  bios => {
    release_date => "06/23/2013",
    vendor => "Example Vendor",
    version => "6.00"
  }
}
[...]

Display a single structured fact:

$ facter processors
{
  count => 2,
  isa => "x86_64",
  models => [
    "Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2680 v2 @ 2.80GHz",
    "Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2680 v2 @ 2.80GHz"
  ],
  physicalcount => 2
}

Display a single fact nested within a structured fact:

$ facter processors.isa
x86_64

Display a single legacy fact. Note that non-structured facts existing in previous versions of Facter are still available, but are not displayed by default due to redundancy with newer structured facts:

$ facter processorcount
2

Format facts as JSON:

$ facter --json os.name os.release.major processors.isa
{
  "os.name": "Ubuntu",
  "os.release.major": "14.04",
  "processors.isa": "x86_64"
}

An example config file:

# always loaded (CLI and as Ruby module)
global : {
    external-dir : "~/external/facts",
    custom-dir   :  [
       "~/custom/facts",
       "~/custom/facts/more-facts"
    ],
    no-external-facts : false,
    no-custom-facts   : false,
    no-ruby           : false
}
# loaded when running from the command line
cli : {
    debug     : false,
    trace     : true,
    verbose   : false,
    log-level : "info"
}
# always loaded, fact-specific configuration
facts : {
    # for valid blocklist entries, use --list-block-groups
    blocklist : [ "file system", "EC2" ],
    # for valid time-to-live entries, use --list-cache-groups
    ttls : [ { "timezone" : 30 days } ]
}

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