systemd sd_id128_get_machine 3 sd_id128_get_machine sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific sd_id128_get_boot sd_id128_get_boot_app_specific sd_id128_get_invocation Retrieve 128-bit IDs #include <systemd/sd-id128.h> int sd_id128_get_machine sd_id128_t *ret int sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific sd_id128_t app_id sd_id128_t *ret int sd_id128_get_boot sd_id128_t *ret int sd_id128_get_boot_app_specific sd_id128_t app_id sd_id128_t *ret int sd_id128_get_invocation sd_id128_t *ret sd_id128_get_machine() returns the machine ID of the executing host. This reads and parses the machine-id5 file. This function caches the machine ID internally to make retrieving the machine ID a cheap operation. This ID may be used wherever a unique identifier for the local system is needed. However, it is recommended to use this ID as-is only in trusted environments. In untrusted environments it is recommended to derive an application specific ID from this machine ID, in an irreversable (cryptographically secure) way. To make this easy sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific() is provided, see below. sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific() is similar to sd_id128_get_machine(), but retrieves a machine ID that is specific to the application that is identified by the indicated application ID. It is recommended to use this function instead of sd_id128_get_machine() when passing an ID to untrusted environments, in order to make sure that the original machine ID may not be determined externally. This way, the ID used by the application remains stable on a given machine, but cannot be easily correlated with IDs used in other applications on the same machine. The application-specific ID should be generated via a tool like systemd-id128 new, and may be compiled into the application. This function will return the same application-specific ID for each combination of machine ID and application ID. Internally, this function calculates HMAC-SHA256 of the application ID, keyed by the machine ID. sd_id128_get_boot() returns the boot ID of the executing kernel. This reads and parses the /proc/sys/kernel/random/boot_id file exposed by the kernel. It is randomly generated early at boot and is unique for every running kernel instance. See random4 for more information. This function also internally caches the returned ID to make this call a cheap operation. It is recommended to use this ID as-is only in trusted environments. In untrusted environments it is recommended to derive an application specific ID using sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific(), see below. sd_id128_get_boot_app_specific() is analogous to sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific() but returns an ID that changes between boots. Some machines may be used for a long time without rebooting, hence the boot ID may remain constant for a long time, and has properties similar to the machine ID during that time. sd_id128_get_invocation() returns the invocation ID of the currently executed service. In its current implementation, this reads and parses the $INVOCATION_ID environment variable that the service manager sets when activating a service, see systemd.exec5 for details. The ID is cached internally. In future a different mechanism to determine the invocation ID may be added. Note that sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific(), sd_id128_get_boot(), sd_id128_get_boot_app_specific(), and sd_id128_get_invocation() always return UUID v4 compatible IDs. sd_id128_get_machine() will also return a UUID v4-compatible ID on new installations but might not on older. It is possible to convert the machine ID into a UUID v4-compatible one. For more information, see machine-id5. For more information about the sd_id128_t type see sd-id1283. Those calls return 0 on success (in which case ret is filled in), or a negative errno-style error code. In particular, sd_id128_get_machine(), sd_id128_get_machine_app_specific(), and sd_id128_get_boot_app_specific() return -ENOENT if /etc/machine-id is missing, and -ENOMEDIUM if is empty or all zeros. First, generate the application ID: $ systemd-id128 -p new As string: c273277323db454ea63bb96e79b53e97 As UUID: c2732773-23db-454e-a63b-b96e79b53e97 As man:sd-id128(3) macro: #define MESSAGE_XYZ SD_ID128_MAKE(c2,73,27,73,23,db,45,4e,a6,3b,b9,6e,79,b5,3e,97) ... Then use the new identifier in an example application: systemd1, systemd-id1281, sd-id1283, machine-id5, systemd.exec5, sd_id128_randomize3, random4