Ubuntu Manpage: dlocate - program to view debian package information

NAME

       dlocate - program to view debian package information

SYNOPSIS

       dlocate [option...] [command]

DESCRIPTION

       dlocate is a fast alternative to dpkg for queries like "dpkg -L" and "dpkg -S".

COMMANDS

pattern...
List all records where either the package name or the filename matches pattern.

Note that dlocate uses GNU grep, so normal regexp metacharacters need to be taken into account or
avoided by using the -F (Fixed String) grep option.

For example, to search for "/usr/bin/[", you might try:

dlocate '/usr/bin/\['

dlocate -F '/usr/bin/['

-S filename...
List all records where only the filename matches the filename pattern.

Note that dlocate uses GNU grep, so normal regexp metacharacters need to be taken into account.
Fixed String searches are incompatible with -S.

For example, to search for "/usr/bin/[", you need to type:

dlocate '/usr/bin/\['

-l package...
Regexp-enhanced emulation of "dpkg -l". Shows all packages which match package.

Internally this uses grep on a file containing the reformatted output of "dpkg -l" (four fields
separated by tabs; status, package-name, installed version, short description) so it will return
packages whose version or short description matches, too.

Various flavours of regular expression are supported. For example, Extended Regexp:

dlocate -l '^..[[:space:]]libc6'

or Perl Regexp:

dlocate -P -l '^..\slibc6'

Both of these will list all the packages whose names start with "libc6".

Note that because of the difference between regular expressions and dpkg's shell-style pattern
matching, the output from "dlocate -l" is occasionally different to the output from "dpkg -l".

This is not a bug, regular expressions are far more flexible than shell pattern matching. This is the
way dlocate is supposed to run, but it may require some knowledge of regular expressions to get the
output you want.

-k List package names of installed kernels and all related packages.

-K Detailed list of installed kernels and all related packages.

-L package...
List all files in package.

The output order is preserved from the one used by dpkg-query, which preserves the order from the
.deb archive, where symlinks are provided at the end to guarantee they point to already unpacked
entries in the filesystem.

-s package...
Print status of package.

--ls package...
"ls -ldF" of all files in package.

--lsconf package...
"ls -ldF" of conffiles in package.

--conf package...
List conffiles in package.

--du package...
"du -sck" of all files in package.

--md5sum package...
List md5sums (if any) of package.

--md5check package...
Check md5sums (if any) of package.

--man package...
List man pages (if any) in package.

--lsman package...
List full path/filenames of man pages (if any) in package.

--lsbin package...
List full path/filenames of executable files (if any) in package.

--lsdir package...
List only the directories in package.

OPTIONS

       --filename-only
           Only output file names when searching for files.

       --package-only
           Only output package names when searching for files.

       -w, --word-regexp
           Select  only  those  lines  containing  matches that form whole words.  The test is that the matching
           substring must either be at the beginning  of  the  line,  or  preceded  by  a  non-word  constituent
           character.  Similarly, it must be either at the end of the line or followed by a non-word constituent
           character.  Word-constituent characters are letters, digits, and the underscore.

       -i, --ignore-case
           Ignore case distinctions in the pattern.

       -E, --extended-regexp
           Interpret pattern as an extended regular expression.  This is the default.

       -F, --fixed-strings
           Interpret pattern as a list of fixed strings, separated by newlines, any of which is to be matched.

       -G, --basic-regexp
           Interpret pattern as a basic regular expression.

       -P, --perl-regexp
           Interpret  pattern as a Perl regular expression.  This is considered to be highly experimental within
           GNU grep and may warn of unimplemented features.

       -h, --help
           Display help message and exit.

       -V, --version
           Display dlocate's version number and exit.

       -v, --verbose, --debug
           Produce verbose debugging output.

       -c, --columns[=columns]
           Set columns width to override the dlocate default of using the entire terminal line width.  Any value
           for columns less than 80 will be increased to 80.

       -C, --color
           Colorize -l or -s output (requires supercat to be installed).

FILES

       /etc/default/dlocate
           Configuration file with default  options.  Currently  the  only  option  is  to  enable/disable  gzip
           compression of /var/lib/dlocate/dlocatedb.

       /var/lib/dlocate/dlocatedb
           Plain text listing of all files belonging to all packages (optionally compressed).

       /var/lib/dlocate/dpkg-list
           Listing of all packages known to dpkg.

           See update-dlocatedb(8) for details.

EXAMPLES

       To find which package "/usr/bin/[" belongs to:

         dlocate '/usr/bin/\['

       To view all man pages contained within the dpkg package:

         man $(dlocate -man dpkg)

       To purge kernel version 2.6.28.7 and all related module packages:

         dlocate -k | grep -- -2.6.28.7 | xargs apt-get purge

       To check the md5sums of the dlocate package:

         dlocate --md5check dlocate

       To use dpkg-repack to make a backup copy of all installed mythtv packages just before upgrading them:

         dlocate -l mythtv | awk '/^.i/ {print $2}' | xargs dpkg-repack

         # dlocate -l mythtv | awk '/^.i/ {print $2}' | xargs dpkg-repack
         dpkg-deb: building package `libmythtv-perl' in `./libmythtv-perl_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv' in `./mythtv_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-backend' in `./mythtv-backend_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-common' in `./mythtv-common_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-database' in `./mythtv-database_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-doc' in `./mythtv-doc_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-frontend' in `./mythtv-frontend_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-perl' in `./mythtv-perl_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-status' in `./mythtv-status_0.9.0-5_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtv-themes' in `./mythtv-themes_0.21-0.0_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `mythtvfs' in `./mythtvfs_0.5.2-2_amd64.deb'.
         dpkg-deb: building package `python-mythtv' in `./python-mythtv_0.21.svn20090414-0.0_amd64.deb'.

NOTES

       dlocate  does  not  update its databases (see FILES section) automatically after new or upgraded packages
       have been installed with dpkg or apt-get etc.

       A daily cron job is run to perform the update.  Or the root user can run update-dlocatedb at any time  to
       force an update.

ENVIRONMENT

       COLUMNS
           Sets the number of columns dlocate should use when displaying formatted text.  Currently only used by
           -l.  Values lower than 80 are increased to 80.