lshw tool and returned options and their meanings

Question

The tool lshw reports information about all connected hardware.

Some reported options and features are simple enough to understand, while others are not.

The documentation page found here and the project page do not define all of these features and their descriptions.

An example of this:

sudo lshw -C net

  *-usb:1                 
       description: Wireless interface
       product: USB2.0 WLAN
       vendor: ATHEROS
       physical id: 3
       bus info: usb@1:1.3
       logical name: wlan2
       version: 1.08
       serial: 12345
       capabilities: usb-2.00 ethernet physical wireless
       configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath9k_htc driverversion=4.9.35-v7+ firmware=1.3 ip=192.168.2.254 link=yes maxpower=500mA multicast=yes speed=480Mbit/s wireless=IEEE 802.11
  *-usb:2
       description: Wireless interface
       product: 802.11n NIC
       vendor: Realtek
       physical id: 4
       bus info: usb@1:1.4
       logical name: wlan1
       version: 0.00
       serial: 123456
       capabilities: usb-2.00 ethernet physical wireless
       configuration: broadcast=yes driver=rtl8812au ip=192.168.1.254 maxpower=500mA multicast=yes speed=480Mbit/s wireless=IEEE 802.11AC
  *-network:0
       description: Wireless interface
       physical id: 2
       logical name: wlan0
       serial: b8:27:eb:b0:32:ae
       capabilities: ethernet physical wireless
       configuration: broadcast=yes driver=brcmfmac driverversion=7.45.41.26 firmware=01-df77e4a7 ip=192.168.8.254 multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11
  *-network:1
       description: Ethernet interface
       physical id: 3
       logical name: eth0
       serial: b8:27:eb:e5:67:fb
       size: 100Mbit/s
       capacity: 100Mbit/s
       capabilities: ethernet physical tp mii 10bt 10bt-fd 100bt 100bt-fd autonegotiation
       configuration: autonegotiation=on broadcast=yes driver=smsc95xx driverversion=22-Aug-2005 duplex=full firmware=smsc95xx USB 2.0 Ethernet ip=192.168.0.254 link=yes multicast=yes port=MII speed=100Mbit/s

Going through each NIC, one can deduce the following:

There are 4 NICs, of which 2 are USB NICs
One can see the link speed, physical address, IP address, logical names, driver name, etc.
Also if the adapter supports multicast, broadcast, etc.

Question:

However, options like link (and possibly others) are not clear or understandable, nor is any definition or description of this given in any documentation.

Where are these configurations/features' descriptions documented?

score 0 · Answer 1 · edited Sep 22 '21 at 04:16

found it for "capabilities"

command: lshw -class network -json

    "capabilities" : {
      "pm" : "Power Management",
      "msi" : "Message Signalled Interrupts",
      "msix" : "MSI-X",
      "pciexpress" : "PCI Express",
      "bus_master" : "bus mastering",
      "cap_list" : "PCI capabilities listing",
      "rom" : "extension ROM",
      "ethernet" : true,
      "physical" : "Physical interface",
      "tp" : "twisted pair",
      "10bt-fd" : "10Mbit/s (full duplex)",
      "100bt-fd" : "100Mbit/s (full duplex)",
      "1000bt-fd" : "1Gbit/s (full duplex)",
      "autonegotiation" : "Auto-negotiation"}

lshw tool and returned options and their meanings

1 Answers1