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WHEREIS(1)                       User Commands                      WHEREIS(1)
NAME
       whereis  -  locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a com-
       mand
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 path-
       name components and any (single) trailing extension of  the  form  .ext
       (for  example:  .c)  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 speci-
       fied 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 com-
              mand 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 documen-
              tation  in Info format, by a whitespace-separated list of direc-
              tories.
       -S list
              Limit the places where whereis searches for sources, by a white-
              space-separated list of directories.
       -f     Terminates  the  directory  list  and signals the start of file-
              names.  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
              Display version information and exit.
EXAMPLE
       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 *
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.
AVAILABILITY
       The  whereis command is part of the util-linux package and is available
       from Linux Kernel Archive <https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-
       linux/>.
util-linux                       October 2014                       WHEREIS(1)