Accidently Deleted a System File...How Do I get it back in?

[newbie2010]

In the Folder /bin I was following along with a tutorial on Linux.org where it was showing me how to edit a file (.bashrc) nad supposedly would not Delte a File without a Warning.....huh...GONE!!!!

The file I would like to put back in the /bin Directory is znew , I am not sure what it does yet but I would like to put it back anyway. Can someone tell me how to redownload that Single File from a Linux Mirror possibly?

Thanks in Advance.

[rokytnji]

What version of Debian?

[rokytnji]

As root user in terminal you can try

apt-get install znew

and see what happens.

You can also try as root in terminal

apt-get --reinstall install znew

[newbie2010]

Version 5.4.0 Debian.....

[newbie2010]

This is what I got.....

debian:/home/sandy# apt-get install znew
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Couldn't find package znew
debian:/home/sandy# apt-get --reinstall install znew
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Couldn't find package znew
debian:/home/sandy#

The File was in the /Bin Directory and there are other Z.....Files

zcat
zdiff
zegrep
zfgrep
zforce
zgrep
zless
zmore


Unless I needed to be in a Specific Place it doesn't appear to work.....Thanks for the Code and Assistance, I do Appreciate it.....

[rokytnji]

My bad. The znew and other stuff is part of the gzip package.

I run AntiX which is based on Debian 6. I think the easy way to fix all this is to go to this page.

znew(1)


So you can know what znew does. You won't be able to get just the znew file you deleted. But here is mine if you want to copy and paste into a new text file and name it znew and put it in /bin

#!/bin/bash

# Copyright (C) 1998, 2002, 2004, 2007 Free Software Foundation
# Copyright (C) 1993 Jean-loup Gailly

# This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.

# This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
# GNU General Public License for more details.

# You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along
# with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
# 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA.

PATH="${GZIP_BINDIR-'/bin'}:$PATH"; export PATH

version="znew (gzip) 1.3.12
Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software. You may redistribute copies of it under the terms of
the GNU General Public License <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

Written by Jean-loup Gailly."

usage="Usage: $0 [OPTION]... [FILE]...
Recompress files from .Z (compress) format to .gz (gzip) format.

Options:

-f Force recompression even if a .gz file already exists.
-t Test the new files before deleting originals.
-v Verbose; display name and statistics for each file compressed.
-9 Use the slowest compression method (optimal compression).
-P Use pipes for the conversion to reduce disk space usage.
-K Keep a .Z file when it is smaller than the .gz file.
--help display this help and exit
--version output version information and exit

Report bugs to <bug-gzip@gnu.org>."

check=0
pipe=0
opt=
files=
keep=0
res=0
old=0
new=0
block=1024
# block is the disk block size (best guess, need not be exact)

warn="(does not preserve modes and timestamp)"
tmp=${TMPDIR-/tmp}/zfoo.$$
set -C
echo hi > $tmp || exit
if test -z "`(${CPMOD-cpmod} $tmp $tmp) 2>&1`"; then
cpmod=${CPMOD-cpmod}
warn=""
fi

if test -z "$cpmod" && ${TOUCH-touch} -r $tmp $tmp 2>/dev/null; then
cpmod="${TOUCH-touch}"
cpmodarg="-r"
warn="(does not preserve file modes)"
fi

# check if GZIP env. variable uses -S or --suffix
gzip -q $tmp
ext=`echo $tmp* | sed "s|$tmp||"`
rm -f $tmp*
if test -z "$ext"; then
echo znew: error determining gzip extension
exit 1
fi
if test "$ext" = ".Z"; then
echo znew: cannot use .Z as gzip extension.
exit 1
fi

for arg
do
case "$arg" in
--help) exec echo "$usage";;
--version) exec echo "$version";;
-*) opt="$opt $arg"; shift;;
*) break;;
esac
done

if test $# -eq 0; then
echo "$usage"
exit 1
fi

opt=`echo "$opt" | sed -e 's/ //g' -e 's/-//g'`
case "$opt" in
*t*) check=1; opt=`echo "$opt" | sed 's/t//g'`
esac
case "$opt" in
*K*) keep=1; opt=`echo "$opt" | sed 's/K//g'`
esac
case "$opt" in
*P*) pipe=1; opt=`echo "$opt" | sed 's/P//g'`
esac
if test -n "$opt"; then
opt="-$opt"
fi

for i do
n=`echo $i | sed 's/.Z$//'`
if test ! -f "$n.Z" ; then
echo $n.Z not found
res=1; continue
fi
test $keep -eq 1 && old=`wc -c < "$n.Z"`
if test $pipe -eq 1; then
if gzip -d < "$n.Z" | gzip $opt > "$n$ext"; then
# Copy file attributes from old file to new one, if possible.
test -n "$cpmod" && $cpmod $cpmodarg "$n.Z" "$n$ext" 2> /dev/null
else
echo error while recompressing $n.Z
res=1; continue
fi
else
if test $check -eq 1; then
if cp -p "$n.Z" "$n.$$" 2> /dev/null || cp "$n.Z" "$n.$$"; then
:
else
echo cannot backup "$n.Z"
res=1; continue
fi
fi
if gzip -d "$n.Z"; then
:
else
test $check -eq 1 && mv "$n.$$" "$n.Z"
echo error while uncompressing $n.Z
res=1; continue
fi
if gzip $opt "$n"; then
:
else
if test $check -eq 1; then
mv "$n.$$" "$n.Z" && rm -f "$n"
echo error while recompressing $n
else
# compress $n (might be dangerous if disk full)
echo error while recompressing $n, left uncompressed
fi
res=1; continue
fi
fi
test $keep -eq 1 && new=`wc -c < "$n$ext"`
if test $keep -eq 1 && test `expr \( $old + $block - 1 \) / $block` -lt \
`expr \( $new + $block - 1 \) / $block`; then
if test $pipe -eq 1; then
rm -f "$n$ext"
elif test $check -eq 1; then
mv "$n.$$" "$n.Z" && rm -f "$n$ext"
else
gzip -d "$n$ext" && compress "$n" && rm -f "$n$ext"
fi
echo "$n.Z smaller than $n$ext -- unchanged"

elif test $check -eq 1; then
if gzip -t "$n$ext" ; then
rm -f "$n.$$" "$n.Z"
else
test $pipe -eq 0 && mv "$n.$$" "$n.Z"
rm -f "$n$ext"
echo error while testing $n$ext, $n.Z unchanged
res=1; continue
fi
elif test $pipe -eq 1; then
rm -f "$n.Z"
fi
done
exit $res

After making the text file. You will need to make it executable. If running Nautilus or pcmanfm. You can open terminal. Log in as root

gksu nautilus

or

gksu pcmanfm

Give password.Enter. File Manager opens as root user. Move the znew text file you named to /bin . Right click on file and select properties. Mark the execute check box. Close File manager. Type exit, then hit enter, in terminal twice.

[rokytnji]

For Future reference. When editing a directory or file. You should backup first before doing anything.

I made a folder in /home I name Backups. Any time I have to edit lets say .conkyrc or /etc/X11/xorg.conf or .xinitrc or antiXexit.sh. I copy and paste the original into /home/Backups. So in case something goes wrong. I can move the copy of the backup back into its original directory to bring everything back to stock configuration.

[newbie2010]

Thank You for your Help, I will be going out of town Friday and will not return until Monday....I'll be having Linux Withdrawls by the time I get back since I just got it installed this Afternoon. It is Refreshing to know there are still Good People in our Country who are willing to assist others, I hope someday I can Repay the Favor and as I continue to learn I will certainly pass on my knowledge and assistance to the New folks who come here in the future. Thank You Again for your help and I will let you know when i get it resolved. Have a Great and Peaceful Memorial Day Holiday.

[Lakshmipathi]

To add more to backup technique suggested by rokytnji - If you didnt take a backup ,
umount the partition from which file is accidentally deleted and try HOWTO undelete removed files and directories on an ext3 file system - if you are using ext4 try extundelete. (similar to ext3grep).

Thank You for your Help, I will be going out of town Friday and will not return until Monday....I'll be having Linux Withdrawls by the time I get back since I just got it installed this Afternoon. It is Refreshing to know there are still Good People in our Country who are willing to assist others, I hope someday I can Repay the Favor and as I continue to learn I will certainly pass on my knowledge and assistance to the New folks who come here in the future. Thank You Again for your help and I will let you know when i get it resolved. Have a Great and Peaceful Memorial Day Holiday.

thanks for your commitment towards linux/open source