The locate command is an invaluable tool when you’re trying to track down a particular file but know only the file name. Locate reads one or more databases prepared by the related updatedb and writes file names matching at least one of the patterns to standard output, one per line.
Pre-Flight Check
- These instructions are intended specifically for installing mlocate on Fedora 23. For CentOS 7, follow the instructions at How to Install mlocate (locate and updatedb Commands) on CentOS 7.
- We’ll be logging in as root to a Liquid Web Self Managed Fedora 23 server.
Step #1: Install mlocate
We’ll first update our packages:
dnf -y update
Then we’ll install mlocate and any required packages:
dnf -y install mlocate
Step #2: Updating mlocate
Upon installation, mlocate installs a systemd timer to regularly update the search database. However, you can manually trigger an update of the search databases with:
updatedb