List all bin files

rng · 12-08-2012, 05:52 AM

When I want to search for a command, I need to find if a file exists in the $PATH directories. I am using following format:

Quote:

echo $PATH | tr ':' ' ' | xargs ls -l

It seems to be working all right but I am not sure if it is covering all directories. Basically, the question is if following format is all right for ls command and will it show all files in all directories put as an argument:

Quote:

ls -l directory1 directory2 directory3 ..

Or is there any better way? Thanks for your help.

unSpawn · 12-08-2012, 07:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rng

When I want to search for a command, I need to find if a file exists in the $PATH directories.

What's the logic behind that? If a command isn't in your path then you get a "command not found"-like error and furthermore there are the common whatis, whereis, which, apropos and (s)locate commands. So what reason should you have to do things the way you do? And BTW if you still need to split the PATH in BASH then you can temporarily change the IFS or use

Code:

"${PATH//:/ }"

but beware the output of 'ls' shouldn't be used for parsing: if you need to then use 'find' instead.

rng · 12-08-2012, 08:59 AM

Sometimes I know of only part of a command, e.g. systemd commands. So I can use the script to find all commands related to systemd.

Can I use following command?

Quote:

echo ${PATH//:/ } | xargs find '{}' | grep -i systemd

I tried and it seems to work all right.

unSpawn · 12-08-2012, 11:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rng

Sometimes I know of only part of a command, e.g. systemd commands. So I can use the script to find all commands related to systemd.

Say I'm on a machine that has a set of configuration commands and they all start with "system-config" (I'll limit output with "|head -2").
'whatis' doesn't like partial input so you have to know more:

Code:

 ~]$ whatis system-c
system-c: nothing appropriate|head -2
~]$ whatis system-config
system-config-date   (8)  - graphical interface for changing system date and time
system-config-date  (rpm) - A graphical interface for modifying system date and time

but with 'apropos' that's no problem:

Code:

~]$ apropos system-c|head -2
system-config-date   (8)  - graphical interface for changing system date and time
system-config-date  (rpm) - A graphical interface for modifying system date and time

'locate' is even more useful as it allows you to use a regex. Here I anchor with "bin/" as it matches both common bin and sbin directory names:

Code:

locate -er bin/sy.*-conf|head -2
/usr/bin/system-config-authentication
/usr/bin/system-config-date

and note expressions like "^.*local/[sb,b]in/[a,c].*" are no problem.

'man' can behave like whatis and apropos so I won't go into that, this command doesn't display file locations but finds all man pages and allows you to "step" through them. A plain "q" keypress quits displaying the current one and moves on to the next.

Code:

~]$ man -a system-conf*

As you can see there's multiple ways to get what you want (as long as the system can run makewhatis, updatedb and other such cron jobs regularly).

In your case try running

Code:

locate -er bin/system.*

rng · 12-08-2012, 09:50 PM

Thanks for your explanations. However, I tried following command but got no output:

Quote:

locate -er bin/*www*

With the earlier command, there is a good output:

Quote:

$ echo $PATH | tr ':' ' ' | xargs ls -l | grep --color='auto' www
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 35 Nov 30 15:53 gnome-www-browser -> /etc/alternatives/gnome-www-browser
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 31 Nov 30 15:53 x-www-browser -> /etc/alternatives/x-www-browser

Furthermore, there is an additional advantage of color with the grep command.

unSpawn · 12-09-2012, 06:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rng

I tried following command but got no output

Meaning updatedb doesn't index the location by default, see 'man updatedb.conf'.