Linux Tips - 5

YUM - "Yello dog Updater, Modified" is the package management tool for Red Hat based linux systems like Fedora, CentOS and others. It uses rpms to install/uninstall packages.

New users can use yum pretty easily. But sometimes you wonder where the package got installed.

Lets say we have just installed the CD/DVD writing software k3b using yum but don't know where exactly it has been installed.

Here is how you can find out the directory where the package gets installed.

[amit@localhost ~]$ rpm -qa | grep k3b

Use above command to find out the exact package name. Note that the same package name, but in upper and lower cases are considered to be different packages by grep. It will give output something like this

[amit@localhost ~]$ rpm -qa | grep k3b
k3b-extras-0.12.17-1.fc6
k3b-0.12.17-1
k3b-extras-nonfree-0.12.17-3.lvn6

Now use following command to find out the directories where k3b related files are installed. Substitute the argument with your package name.

[amit@localhost ~]$ rpm -ql k3b-0.12.17-1

Depending on the software it may show hundreds of directories. The executable file would be mostly the one that is under /usr/bin or /usr/share/apps/

It will also show you other details like where the documentation is stored, where the icons are stored, where the header files are etc.