Linux search for text in files and subdirectories

Linux search for text in files and subdirectories install#
Linux search for text in files and subdirectories update#

This is useful in finding the location of an executable for creating a shortcut to the program on the desktop, on a panel, or other place in the desktop manager. The вЂњwhichвЂќ command returns the absolute path of the executable that is called when a command is issued. The same help screen displays for both commands. The mlocate command will not work until the database is created either manually or when the script is run from cron.ДЇor more information about either the locate or the mlocate command, type man locate or man mlocate in a Terminal window and press Enter. Therefore, you may want to create the database manually by typing the following command at the prompt: sudo /etc/cron.daily/mlocate The mlocate command does not use the same database file as the standard locate command. NOTE: We will show you a command later in this article that allows you to determine where the executable for a command is located, if it exists.

Linux search for text in files and subdirectories install#

To install mlocate, if itвЂ™s not already included in your Linux distribution, type the following command at the prompt. When you install mlocate, the /usr/bin/locate binary file changes to point to mlocate. This allows mlocate to know if the contents of a directory changed without reading the contents again and makes updates to the database faster and less demanding on your hard drive.

Linux search for text in files and subdirectories update#

When you update the mlocate database, it keeps timestamp information in the database. It indexes the entire file system, but the search results only include files to which the current user has access. The mlocate command is a new implementation of locate. In the above example, the backslash disables the implicit replacement of вЂњmydataвЂќ by вЂњ*mydata*вЂќ so you end up with only results containing вЂњmydata.вЂќ The most common wildcard symbols are the question mark ( ? ), which stands for a single character and the asterisk ( * ), which stands for a contiguous string of characters. A wildcard is a symbol that can be replaced by one or more characters when the expression is evaluated. The backslash in the above command is a globbing character, which provides a way of expanding wildcard characters in a non-specific file name into a set of specific filenames. If you want to find all files or directories that contain exactly and only your search criteria, use the -b option with the locate command, as follows. locate mydataДЇor example, the above command found two files containing вЂњmydataвЂќ and one file containing вЂњdata.вЂќ The basic form of the locate command finds all the files on the file system, starting at the root, that contain all or any part of the search criteria. To do this, type the following command at the prompt: sudo updatedb The database is updated periodically from cron, but you can also update it yourself at any time so you can obtain up-to-the-minute results. The locate command returns a list of all path names containing the specified group of characters. The locate command is faster than the find command because it uses a previously built database, whereas the find command searches in the real system, through all the actual directories and files.

For more information about the find command, run man find in a Terminal window and press Enter. The find command has a lot of options available for refining the search.

If find doesnвЂ™t locate any files matching your criteria, it produces no output. It is the case insensitive version of the -name command. If you want the search for a word or phrase to be case insensitive, use the -iname option with the find command. NOTE: The find command defaults to being case sensitive. All files in the current directory starting with вЂњproвЂќ are listed.