The LOCATE command on Solaris machines     -Brad Lucier

The department has activated a database of all world-readable files
on peano (basically, almost all user files that are world-readable,
and most files in the locally-installed software for Solaris).  One
uses it by saying

% locate [options] file-name-pattern

Do "man locate" for details.

This will have a number of benefits:

1.  It will help you find your own world-readable files quickly. (You can
    use the find command to find non-world-readable files, do "man find"
    to find out more.)

2.  It will help you find out if we have particular software installed, i.e.
    you can say "locate wavelet" and see if anything in the matlab directory
    comes up.

3.  You can find out if other people have useful files in their own directories,
    i.e., you can say

% locate ".sty"

    to find all the TeX style files on the system, and see if a particular
    one you need has been installed either publicly or in someone's own
    directory.

Basically, this database will help people share information, which is a good
thing.

It will also help people find information that you don't want shared but
haven't protected.  For example, if Joe Blow doesn't have his tests directory
protected, right now a student can say

% cd ~jblow/tests
% ls

and have a look around.  But with the new locate command it will be even
easier:

% locate test | grep jblow

will give all files owned by jblow with test in their names.

So if you don't know how to keep confidential the files you want kept
confidential, go this week to Steve Bell's web page at

http://www.math.purdue.edu/~bell/Computers/filemodes

to find out how to keep secrets in your directories and files.  You
can learn even more by looking at any of the Unix books we keep on
reserve in the library for reference purposes.

Brad