Is the `reboot` command safe to use?

Question

The reboot command appears to work differently depending on the distribution.

For example on Ubuntu/Debian and CentOS it shuts down services first while on Arch Linux it reboots immediately (at least with my setup).

Is it always safe to use reboot?

Since reboot in Arch Linux is actually systemctl, I strongly doubt it doesn't stop services. — muru, Aug 23 '17 at 11:34
@muru so that means it's always safe to use? If I sudo reboot on Arch I see the boot screen in ~0 secs. — laktak, Aug 23 '17 at 11:36
@laktak I see it in a couple of seconds, but usually faster than in, say Ubuntu. It depends on what you run and what you're running it on. — muru, Aug 23 '17 at 11:43
As far as I understand, the safest command should be shutdown -r. Could someone confirm that? — a.j. tawleed, Sep 17 '17 at 11:09

score 10 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 23 '17 at 12:13

10

I found a very good explanation here

The BSD halt and reboot commands were low-level, drastic, and immediate. The considerate way to shut down a BSD system was the shutdown command, which did all of the things that one expects to happen: wall messages to users, services gracefully killed, log entries written, logins disabled, and so forth.

It also explains that on the systemd toolset it always shuts down services first like @muru mentioned.

answered Aug 23 '17 at 12:13

laktak

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Yeah, I do remember fairly well the first time I issued an halt in a Solaris server... catastrophic. – Rui F Ribeiro Aug 23 '17 at 17:51

Is the `reboot` command safe to use?

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