whereis - locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a command
Contents
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 2.40.2 2024-04-24 WHEREIS(1)
Description
whereis locates the binary, source and manual files for the specified command names. The supplied names
are firststrippedofleadingpathnamecomponents. 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-bmlstr-mgcc
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-mls-M/usr/share/man/man1-fcal
searches for "ls" man pages in all default paths, but for "cal" in the /usr/share/man/man1 directory
only.
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/binwhereis-u-ms-M/usr/man/man1-S/usr/src-f*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.
Name
whereis - locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a command
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.
-Blist
Limit the places where whereis searches for binaries, by a whitespace-separated list of directories.
-Mlist
Limit the places where whereis searches for manuals and documentation in Info format, by a
whitespace-separated list of directories.
-Slist
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.
-g
Interpret the next names as a glob(7) patterns. whereis always compares only filenames (aka basename)
and never complete path. Using directory names in the pattern has no effect. Don’t forget that the
shell interprets the pattern when specified on the command line without quotes. It’s necessary to use
quotes for the name, for example:
whereis -g 'find*'
-h, --help
Display help text and exit.
-V, --version
Print version and exit.
Reporting Bugs
For bug reports, use the issue tracker at https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues.
Synopsis
whereis [options] [-BMSdirectory... -f] name...
