NAME

bootc-switch - Target a new container image reference to boot

SYNOPSIS

bootc switch [OPTIONS...] <TARGET>

DESCRIPTION

Target a new container image reference to boot.

This is almost exactly the same operation as upgrade, but additionally changes the container image reference instead.

Usage

A common pattern is to have a management agent control operating system updates via container image tags; for example, quay.io/exampleos/someuser:v1.0 and quay.io/exampleos/someuser:v1.1 where some machines are tracking :v1.0, and as a rollout progresses, machines can be switched to v:1.1.

Applying Changes

The --apply option will automatically take action (rebooting) if the system has changed after switching to the new image. Currently, this option always reboots the system. In the future, this command may detect cases where no kernel changes are queued and perform a userspace-only restart instead.

Soft Reboot

The --soft-reboot option configures soft reboot behavior when used with --apply:

• required: The operation will fail if soft reboot is not available on the target system
• auto: Uses soft reboot if available on the target system, otherwise falls back to a regular reboot

Soft reboot allows faster system restart by avoiding full hardware reboot when possible.

OPTIONS

TARGET

Target image to use for the next boot

This argument is required.

--quiet

Don't display progress

--apply

Restart or reboot into the new target image

--soft-reboot=SOFT_REBOOT

Configure soft reboot behavior

Possible values:
- required
- auto

--transport=TRANSPORT

The transport; e.g. oci, oci-archive, containers-storage.  Defaults to `registry`

Default: registry

--enforce-container-sigpolicy

This is the inverse of the previous `--target-no-signature-verification` (which is now a no-op)

--retain

Retain reference to currently booted image

EXAMPLES

Switch to a different image version:

bootc switch quay.io/exampleos/myapp:v1.1

Switch and immediately apply the changes:

bootc switch --apply quay.io/exampleos/myapp:v1.1

Switch with soft reboot if possible:

bootc switch --apply --soft-reboot=auto quay.io/exampleos/myapp:v1.1

SEE ALSO

bootc(8), bootc-upgrade(8), bootc-status(8), bootc-rollback(8)

VERSION

The Linux Foundation® (TLF) has registered trademarks and uses trademarks. For a list of TLF trademarks, see Trademark Usage.