How to find files, using command line (locate)

Continuing reviewing some of my old posts, I found this one Examples of find command, now I want to show you a faster and easier way to find files.

We are going to use the commands updatedb and locate

updatedb

This command will update the database of the files in a given file system, with no arguments, it will read from / to all file system structure looking for files and archiving the data in the database, located in Debian (/var/cache/locate/locatedb).

There is an option for those using NFS (like me) that you can use to include your NFS file system in the database.

--netpaths=’path1 path2...’

So you can enter a command like this:

sudo updatedb --netpaths=/media/nfs_drive

Now that you have your database updated lets find files.

locate

You just need to enter:

locate filename

and the file named filename will be showed, example:

locate apt-cacher -b

The output is:

/etc/apache2/conf.d/apt-cacher.conf
/etc/apt-cacher
/etc/apt-cacher/apt-cacher.conf
/etc/cron.daily/apt-cacher
/etc/default/apt-cacher
/etc/init.d/apt-cacher
/etc/logrotate.d/apt-cacher
/etc/rc0.d/K20apt-cacher
/etc/rc1.d/K20apt-cacher
/etc/rc2.d/K20apt-cacher
/etc/rc3.d/S20apt-cacher
/etc/rc4.d/S20apt-cacher
/etc/rc5.d/S20apt-cacher
/etc/rc6.d/K20apt-cacher
/etc/rcS.d/S20apt-cacher
/usr/lib/cgi-bin/apt-cacher
/usr/sbin/apt-cacher
/usr/share/apt-cacher
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-cleanup.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-format-transition.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-import.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-lib-cs.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-lib.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-precache.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-cacher-report.pl
/usr/share/apt-cacher/apt-proxy-to-apt-cacher
/usr/share/doc/apt-cacher
/usr/share/man/man1/apt-cacher.1.gz
/var/cache/apt-cacher
/var/cache/apt-cacher/headers/apt-cacher_1.6.1_all.deb
/var/cache/apt-cacher/packages/apt-cacher_1.6.1_all.deb
/var/cache/apt-cacher/private/apt-cacher_1.6.1_all.deb.complete
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.conffiles
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.list
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.md5sums
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.postinst
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.postrm
/var/lib/dpkg/info/apt-cacher.prerm
/var/log/apt-cacher
/var/run/apt-cacher.pid

With the option -b only shows the files where the final part of the name matches the given file name, otherwise, it will show you the full content of the directory /etc/apt-cacher.