Linux Tutorial Series – 131 – Finding a package

Here is the video version, if you prefer it:

To preface this: I personally always use Google to find the packages I need. Either I look for the package name on the distribution website or I am looking for specific packages I need to install for some purpose. I never used the commands that follow so far, but they are useful to know about.

To find a package you want to install, you can use the following command: (Shotts, 2019)⁠

apt-cache search query

An example:

mislav@mislavovo-racunalo:~/Linux_folder$ apt-cache search zip

advancecomp - collection of recompression utilities

node-almond - minimal AMD API implementation for use in optimized browser builds

amanda-client - Advanced Maryland Automatic Network Disk Archiver (Client)

amanda-server - Advanced Maryland Automatic Network Disk Archiver (Server)

…

You get a list of packages related to your search query.

You can also use

apt search query

for the same purpose.

Hope you learned something useful!

References

Shotts, W. (2019). The Linux Command Line, Fifth Internet Edition. Retrieved from http://linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php. Page 199