Linux "lastb" Command Line Options and Examples
show a listing of last logged in users

last searches back through the /var/log/wtmp file (or the file designated by the -f option) and displays a list of all users logged in (and out) since that file was created. One or more usernames and/or ttys can be given, in which case last will show only the entries matching those arguments. Names of ttys can be abbreviated, thus last 0 is the same as last tty0.


Usage:

last [options] [username...] [tty...]
    lastb [options] [username...] [tty...]






Command Line Options:

-a
Display the hostname in the last column. Useful in combination with the --dns option.
lastb -a ...
-d
For non-local logins, Linux stores not only the host name of the remote host, but its IP number as well. This option trans‐lates the IP number back into a hostname.
lastb -d ...
-f
Tell last to use a specific file instead of /var/log/wtmp. The --file option can be given multiple times, and all of thespecified files will be processed.
lastb -f ...
-F
Print full login and logout times and dates.
lastb -F ...
-i
Like --dns , but displays the host's IP number instead of the name.
lastb -i ...
-n
Tell last how many lines to show.
lastb -n ...
-p
Display the users who were present at the specified time. This is like using the options --since and --until together withthe same time.
lastb -p ...
-R
Suppresses the display of the hostname field.
lastb -R ...
-s
Display the state of logins since the specified time. This is useful, e.g., to easily determine who was logged in at a par‐ticular time. The option is often combined with --until.
lastb -s ...
-t
Display the state of logins until the specified time.
lastb -t ...
--time-format
Define the output timestamp format to be one of notime, short, full, or iso. The notime variant will not print any timestampsat all, short is the default, and full is the same as the --fulltimes option. The iso variant will display the timestamp inISO-8601 format. The ISO format contains timezone information, making it preferable when printouts are investigated outsideof the system.
lastb --time-format ...
-w
Display full user names and domain names in the output.
lastb -w ...
-x
Display the system shutdown entries and run level changes.TIME FORMATSThe options that take the time argument understand the following formats:YYYYMMDDhhmmssYYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ssYYYY-MM-DD hh:mm (seconds will be set to 00)YYYY-MM-DD (time will be set to 00:00:00)hh:mm:ss (date will be set to today)hh:mm (date will be set to today, seconds to 00)nowyesterday (time is set to 00:00:00)today (time is set to 00:00:00)tomorrow (time is set to 00:00:00)+5min
lastb -x ...
-5days
NOTESThe files wtmp and btmp might not be found. The system only logs information in these files if they are present. This is a localconfiguration issue. If you want the files to be used, they can be created with a simple touch(1) command (for example, touch/var/log/wtmp).FILES/var/log/wtmp/var/log/btmpAUTHORMiquel van Smoorenburg ⟨miquels@cistron.nl⟩AVAILABILITYThe last command is part of the util-linux package and is available from Linux Kernel Archive ⟨https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/⟩.
lastb -5days ...