SALT-MASTER(1)

NAME
salt-master - salt-master Documentation

The Salt master daemon, used to control the Salt minions

SYNOPSIS

    salt-master [ options ]

DESCRIPTION

The master daemon controls the Salt minions

OPTIONS

--version
    Print the version of Salt that is running.

--versions-report
    Show program's dependencies and version number, and then exit

-h, --help
    Show the help message and exit

-c CONFIG_DIR, --config-dir=CONFIG_dir
    The location of the Salt configuration directory. This directory contains the configuration files for Salt master and minions. The default location on most systems is /etc/salt.

-u USER, --user=USER
    Specify user to run salt-master

-d, --daemon
    Run salt-master as a daemon

--pid-file PIDFILE
    Specify the location of the pidfile. Default: /var/run/salt-master.pid

--disable-keepalive
    Disable the automatic restart mechanism for salt-master. By default, the daemon runs in a subprocess with automatic restart capabilities if it exits with a keepalive signal. This option disables that behavior and runs the daemon directly without the keepalive wrapper. Useful when an external process manager like systemd handles restarts, or in containerized environments where the container runtime manages the process lifecycle

  Logging Options

Logging options which override any settings defined on the configuration files.

-l LOG_LEVEL, --log-level=LOG_LEVEL
    Console logging log level. One of all, garbage, trace, debug, info, warning, error, quiet. Default: warning.

--log-file=LOG_FILE
    Log file path. Default: /var/log/salt/master.

--log-file-level=LOG_LEVEL_LOGFILE
    Logfile logging log level. One of all, garbage, trace, debug, info, warning, error, quiet. Default: warning.

SEE ALSO

salt(1) salt(7) salt-minion(1)

Author
Thomas S. Hatch <thatch45@gmail.com> and many others, please see the Authors file

Copyright
2026