How to do a basic file search????

[mistypotato]

In Windows, if I want to search for a file in a folder, for example all files with an HTML extension, I can simply put *.html in the files and folders search box. Windows dutifully and nicely returns all files with that extension.

This does not appear to work with ubuntu?

Is there a way to search for files of a particular extension in Ubuntu?

thx

[alindgr1]

It works for me fine. I use the typical "Search For Files" at the bottom of the Places menu. I just type in *.whatever, tell it where to look, at it finds them all. No problems at all.

[MrWES]

In Windows, if I want to search for a file in a folder, for example all files with an HTML extension, I can simply put *.html in the files and folders search box. Windows dutifully and nicely returns all files with that extension.

This does not appear to work with ubuntu?

Is there a way to search for files of a particular extension in Ubuntu?

thx

Open Nautilus (the file manager/browser), Places | Home, then navigate to the folder you want to search and then type in your criteria. Or Places, Search, or use Beagle search tool.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Beagle

Bill

[RuneGeek]

Don't forget that filenames are case-sensitive in Linux. If you are searching for *.html and you have files named *.HTML, they won't show up in your search list.

[superprash2003]

another good option would be Google desktop ,works really well for me in ubuntu

[BobJam]

A related question . . . how do you get it to search the entire computer? Seems like it will only search one particular media/file system at a time.

Hate to make a comparison to Windows, but in Windows you could search all drives at once (I guess that would be partitions in Ubuntu).

[credobyte]

find / -name *.config


More info:

man find

[philinux]

A related question . . . how do you get it to search the entire computer? Seems like it will only search one particular media/file system at a time.

Hate to make a comparison to Windows, but in Windows you could search all drives at once (I guess that would be partitions in Ubuntu).

Places search for files> look in folder > File system or disk if mounted etc.

[HotShotDJ]

A related question . . . how do you get it to search the entire computer? Seems like it will only search one particular media/file system at a time.I don't often (ever?) need to search my entire computer -- I usually know approximately where what I'm looking for is located (/, /home, /var, /media/disk, etc)... but then again, I've been using Linux for 8 years, so I'm familiar with where things ought to be.

So, I tested. Go to Places -> Search for files.. (you can add this to your panel as an applet if you want). Put in your search term. To search your entire computer, simply select "File System" from the "Look in folder" drop-down menu. It sucessfully searched and found files contained in my root partition (/; sda1) and my home partition (/home; sda3). It did not search the USB flash drive that I had plugged in (/media/disk; sdb1). I suspect (but have not tested) that it only searches drives/file systems listed in /etc/fstab.

I also noted that, unlike command line search tools, the search is NOT case sensitive. When I did a search for "*.dll" (because I know there are *.dll files on all the mounted partitions), it returned files that matched both *.DLL and *.dll.

I hope this information is helpful to you.

[XCan]

locate *.html is a very fast way to search your entire filesystem. Of course, that's because it uses cached information, but still if the file is not super recent it will be faster.

[philinux]

locate *.html is a very fast way to search your entire filesystem. Of course, that's because it uses cached information, but still if the file is not super recent it will be faster.

Needs

sudo updatedb

running first.

[oldos2er]

A nice GUI search tool is catfish, in the repositories.

[XCan]

Needs

sudo updatedb

running first.

Indeed it does, however, it appears that it does run automatically periodically, as I can locate recent files with no trouble. According to man, it usually runs daily, but I couldn't find an entry in root's crontab. As I said, it searches a cache and won't be able to find very recent files.