lfs-book/chapter06/findutils.xml

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<sect1 id="ch-system-findutils" xreflabel="Findutils" role="wrap">
<title>Findutils-&findutils-version;</title>
<?dbhtml filename="findutils.html"?>

<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils"><primary sortas="a-Findutils">Findutils</primary></indexterm>

<sect2 role="package"><title/>
<para>The Findutils package contains programs to find files. Processes
are provided to recursively search through a directory tree and to
create, maintain and search a database (often faster than the recursive
find, but unreliable if the database has not been recently updated).</para>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>&buildtime;</segtitle>
<segtitle>&diskspace;</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>0.2 SBU</seg><seg>7.5 MB</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>Findutils installation depends on</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>Bash, Binutils, Coreutils,
Diffutils, GCC, Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, Sed</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>
</sect2>

<sect2 role="installation">
<title>Installation of Findutils</title>

<para>Prepare Findutils for compilation:</para>

<screen><userinput>./configure --prefix=/usr --libexecdir=/usr/lib/locate \
    --localstatedir=/var/lib/locate</userinput></screen>

<para>The localstatedir directive above changes the location of the locate
database to be in <filename class="directory">/var/lib/locate</filename>,
which is FHS-compliant.</para>

<para>Compile the package:</para>

<screen><userinput>make</userinput></screen>

<para>To test the results, issue:
<userinput>make check</userinput>.</para>

<para>Now install the package:</para>

<screen><userinput>make install</userinput></screen>

</sect2>


<sect2 id="contents-findutils" role="content"><title>Contents of Findutils</title>

<segmentedlist>
<segtitle>Installed programs</segtitle>
<seglistitem><seg>bigram, code, find, frcode, locate, updatedb and xargs</seg></seglistitem>
</segmentedlist>

<variablelist><title>Short descriptions</title>

<varlistentry id="bigram">
<term><command>bigram</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils bigram"><primary sortas="b-bigram">bigram</primary></indexterm>
<para>was formerly used to produce <command>locate</command> databases.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="code">
<term><command>code</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils code"><primary sortas="b-code">code</primary></indexterm>
<para>was formerly used to produce <command>locate</command>
databases. It is the ancestor of <command>frcode</command>.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="find">
<term><command>find</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils find"><primary sortas="b-find">find</primary></indexterm>
<para>searches given directory trees for files matching the specified criteria.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="frcode">
<term><command>frcode</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils frcode"><primary sortas="b-frcode">frcode</primary></indexterm>
<para>is called by <command>updatedb</command> to compress the list of file names. It uses
front-compression, reducing the database size by a factor of 4 to 5.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="locate">
<term><command>locate</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils locate"><primary sortas="b-locate">locate</primary></indexterm>
<para>searches through a database of file names,
and reports the names that contain a given string or match a given pattern.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="updatedb">
<term><command>updatedb</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils updatedb"><primary sortas="b-updatedb">updatedb</primary></indexterm>
<para>updates the <command>locate</command> database. It scans
the entire file system (including other file systems that are currently mounted,
unless told not to) and puts every file name it finds in the database.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry id="xargs">
<term><command>xargs</command></term>
<listitem>
<indexterm zone="ch-system-findutils xargs"><primary sortas="b-xargs">xargs</primary></indexterm>
<para>can be used to apply a given command to a list of files.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
</variablelist>

</sect2>

</sect1>