WHEREIS(1) User Commands WHEREIS(1)
NAME
whereis - locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a
command
SYNOPSIS
whereis [options] [-BMS directory... -f] name...
DESCRIPTION
whereis locates the binary, source and manual files for the specified
command names. The supplied names are first stripped of leading
pathname components. Prefixes of s. resulting from use of source code
control are also dealt with. whereis then attempts to locate the
desired program in the standard Linux places, and in the places
specified by $PATH and $MANPATH.
The search restrictions (options -b, -m and -s) are cumulative and
apply to the subsequent name patterns on the command line. Any new
search restriction resets the search mask. For example,
whereis -bm ls tr -m gcc
searches for "ls" and "tr" binaries and man pages, and for "gcc" man
pages only.
The options -B, -M and -S reset search paths for the subsequent name
patterns. For example,
whereis -m ls -M /usr/share/man/man1 -f cal
searches for "ls" man pages in all default paths, but for "cal" in the
/usr/share/man/man1 directory only.
OPTIONS
-b
Search for binaries.
-m
Search for manuals.
-s
Search for sources.
-u
Only show the command names that have unusual entries. A command is
said to be unusual if it does not have just one entry of each
explicitly requested type. Thus 'whereis -m -u *' asks for those
files in the current directory which have no documentation file, or
more than one.
-B list
Limit the places where whereis searches for binaries, by a
whitespace-separated list of directories.
-M list
Limit the places where whereis searches for manuals and
documentation in Info format, by a whitespace-separated list of
directories.
-S list
Limit the places where whereis searches for sources, by a
whitespace-separated list of directories.
-f
Terminates the directory list and signals the start of filenames.
It must be used when any of the -B, -M, or -S options is used.
-l
Output the list of effective lookup paths that whereis is using.
When none of -B, -M, or -S is specified, the option will output the
hard-coded paths that the command was able to find on the system.
-h, --help
Display help text and exit.
-V, --version
Print version and exit.
FILE SEARCH PATHS
By default whereis tries to find files from hard-coded paths, which are
defined with glob patterns. The command attempts to use the contents of
$PATH and $MANPATH environment variables as default search path. The
easiest way to know what paths are in use is to add the -l listing
option. Effects of the -B, -M, and -S are displayed with -l.
ENVIRONMENT
WHEREIS_DEBUG=all
enables debug output.
EXAMPLES
To find all files in /usr/bin which are not documented in /usr/man/man1
or have no source in /usr/src:
cd /usr/bin whereis -u -ms -M /usr/man/man1 -S /usr/src -f *
REPORTING BUGS
For bug reports, use the issue tracker at
https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues.
AVAILABILITY
The whereis command is part of the util-linux package which can be
downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive
<https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>.
util-linux 2.38.1 2022-05-11 WHEREIS(1)
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