I have an ec2 instance of which I cannot tell the exact operating system.

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Editorial Team

Asked: June 9, 20262026-06-09T02:01:41+00:00 2026-06-09T02:01:41+00:00

I typed in uname -a and it shows:

2.6.18-274.7.1.el5xen #1 SMP Thu Oct 20 17:06:34 EDT 2011 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

It’s not indicating whether it’s ubuntu, centOS, debian, or others. Anybody have any ideas?

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Editorial Team · Answer 1 · 2026-06-09T02:01:42+00:00

Editorial Team

lsb_release is one command to look into. Here’s the manpage: http://linux.die.net/man/1/lsb_release

Sample usage:

ben@ubuntu:~$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description:    Ubuntu 11.10
Release:    11.10
Codename:   oneiric

Or you can specify just the distributor id:

ben@ubuntu:~$ lsb_release -i
Distributor ID: Ubuntu

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