How to change the console_loglevel in linux?

Question

I read at multiple places (e.g. here http://elinux.org/Debugging_by_printing), that you can change the console log level by echoing an integer to /proc/sys/kernel/printk. If that worked shouldn't the first integer have changed to 5 below?

[root@localhost printk]# cat /proc/sys/kernel/printk
4   4   1   7
[root@localhost printk]# echo 5>/proc/sys/kernel/printk

[root@localhost printk]# cat /proc/sys/kernel/printk
4   4   1   7

I tried this on multiple systems and it didn't change on any of them!

Solution

Moved comment to answer.

You must leave a space between a number and > or the shell will redirect that file descriptor. Use

echo 5 >/proc/sys/kernel/printk

Or

dmesg -n 5

Comments

[meuh]

Ouch! You must leave a space between a number and > or the shell will redirect that file descriptor. Use echo 5 >/proc/sys/kernel/printk. Or dmesg -n 5.

[Lavya]

you're right. that works solves the problem. thanks!

[debug]

sudo sh -c 'echo 8 > /proc/sys/kernel/printk'

[Kusalananda]

@debug Note that the user is already root.

[ingli]

elinux.org/Debugging_by_printing offers an information about the meaning of different log levels

[Stephen Kitt]

In addition to that, the question has already been answered — see the comments underneath the question. The existing answer reflects the comment which resolved the asker’s problem.