dd

Convert and copy a file. More information: https://keith.github.io/xcode-man-pages/dd.1.html.

• Make a bootable USB drive from an isohybrid file (such like archlinux-xxx.iso) and show the progress:

dd if={{path/to/file.iso}} of={{/dev/usb_device}} status=progress

• Clone a drive to another drive with 4 MB block, ignore error and show the progress:

dd if={{/dev/source_device}} of={{/dev/dest_device}} bs={{4m}} conv={{noerror}} status=progress

• Generate a file of 100 random bytes by using kernel random driver:

dd if=/dev/urandom of={{path/to/random_file}} bs={{100}} count={{1}}

• Benchmark the write performance of a disk:

dd if=/dev/zero of={{path/to/1GB_file}} bs={{1024}} count={{1000000}}

• Generate a system backup into an IMG file and show the progress:

dd if=/dev/{{drive_device}} of={{path/to/file.img}} status=progress

• Restore a drive from an IMG file and show the progress:

dd if={{path/to/file.img}} of={{/dev/drive_device}} status=progress

• Check the progress of an ongoing dd operation (run this command from another shell):

kill -USR1 $(pgrep ^dd)