Where can I find source code of linux commands ?

[lacamoura]

Yes, I know that : Linux is an open source operating system

But I try to do : cat /bin/ls (for exemple) but nothing happen !

because as everyone know that ls,cat,touch.... is compiled

so I try search for an open source of linux component but I get nothing

Can you please tell me where can I find it ?

thanks

and sorry for my english

[Irithori]

For fedora (or redhat based distros), the investigation could look like this:

1) Query, which package owns the binary:

[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ rpm -qf /bin/ls
coreutils-8.12-2.fc16.i686

2) Look at the meta informations of that package

 [irithori@fedora16 ~]$ rpm -qi coreutils
Name        : coreutils
Version     : 8.12
Release     : 2.fc16
Architecture: i686
Install Date: Do 03 Nov 2011 03:28:42 CET
Group       : System Environment/Base
Size        : 14074151
License     : GPLv3+
Signature   : RSA/SHA256, Di 26 Jul 2011 04:30:13 CEST, Key ID 067f00b6a82ba4b7
Source RPM  : coreutils-8.12-2.fc16.src.rpm
Build Date  : Fr 15 Jul 2011 16:09:16 CEST
Build Host  : x86-17.phx2.fedoraproject.org
Relocations : (not relocatable)
Packager    : Fedora Project
Vendor      : Fedora Project
URL         : http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/
Summary     : A set of basic GNU tools commonly used in shell scripts
Description :
These are the GNU core utilities.  This package is the combination of
the old GNU fileutils, sh-utils, and textutils packages.

This gives you the hint to the website of the package:
Coreutils - GNU core utilities
and also informs you, that there is a src.rpm coreutils-8.12-2.fc16.src.rpm

3) Look at / get the source
You can now visit the website Coreutils - GNU core utilities

4 (optional) ) Get yumdownloader
Unfortunately, yum cannot download src.rpms.
yumdownloader needs to be used, which is part of the yum-utils package:

[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ sudo yum install yum-utils

5) Get / look at the src.rpm
This procedure provides the exact sources/patches/specfile, that was used to build the binaries.

[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ yumdownloader --source coreutils
[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ rpm -i coreutils-8.12-2.fc16.src.rpm
[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ ls -la ~/rpmbuild/SOURCES/
[irithori@fedora16 ~]$ ls -la ~/rpmbuild/SPECS/

For deb based distributions, the workflow is similar.

You can also always look in the man pages and the documentation for the source websites.

[lacamoura]

thank you Irithori for your response

OK, I understand that rpm can gives me some informations abouts packages.

so I installed rpm on backtrack (VMware) but he gives me :

root@bt:~# rpm -qf /bin/ls
file /bin/ls is not owned by any package

my question is : rpm + "-qt" doesn't work on deb based distributions, or just on backtrack, or there is another way ?

[atreyu]

It seems Backtrack Linux is based on Kubuntu, based upon the FAQ. That distro uses apt-get (and dpkg) for software package management. The yum/rpm tools are used for RPM-based systems like Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Fedora, CentOS, etc.

You can use dpkg to do similar package queries that Iriothori gave you for rpm.

[lacamoura]

aha ok ok

I get what I want.

and its like that for who want to know :

to get the name of package owning the file "ls" for example we use -S option

root@bt:~# dpkg -S /bin/ls
coreutils: /bin/ls

That means "ls" is in "coreutils"

to get some informations about "coreutils" we use -p

root@bt:~# dpkg -p coreutils
Package: coreutils
Essential: yes
Priority: required
Section: utils
Installed-Size: 12152
Origin: Ubuntu
Maintainer: Ubuntu Developers <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com>
Bugs: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+filebug
Architecture: i386
Version: 7.4-2ubuntu3
Replaces: mktemp
Pre-Depends: libacl1 (>= 2.2.11-1), libattr1 (>= 2.4.41-1), libc6 (>= 2.11), libselinux1 (>= 1.32)
Filename: pool/main/c/coreutils/coreutils_7.4-2ubuntu3_i386.deb
Size: 2435184
MD5sum: 281a29d693b727da79f0fe17a4ceb422
Description: The GNU core utilities
 This package contains the essential basic system utilities.
 .
 Specifically, this package includes:
 basename cat chgrp chmod chown chroot cksum comm cp csplit cut date dd df dir
 dircolors dirname du echo env expand expr factor false fmt fold groups head
 hostid id install join link ln logname ls md5sum mkdir mkfifo mknod mktemp
 mv nice nl nohup od paste pathchk pinky pr printenv printf ptx pwd readlink
 rm rmdir sha1sum seq shred sleep sort split stat stty sum sync tac tail tee
 test touch tr true tsort tty uname unexpand uniq unlink users vdir wc who
 whoami yes
Original-Maintainer: Michael Stone <mstone@debian.org>
SHA1: b9c65407cda75a7e4ecc25f75e642d032d547b98
SHA256: f4a344340050d8ebdaffe87447d3967955d52210bd319255ad8702eda65b1df8
Supported: 5y
Task: minimal

thank you again Irithori and atreyu.

[Rubberman]

All distributions have mirror sites where you can access and download source packages for the kernel as well as all of the applications in their repositories. Also, most Linux utilities are GNU tools, and those you can access/download from www.gnu.org, though their site is participating in the "No SOPA" protest today and will be dark until midnight - probably US Eastern Standard Time.

[cynwulf]

If you just want to grab the source on a Debian based distro

apt-get source package-foo

Where "package-foo" substitute the relevant package name.

Note: -

You do not need to be root.

You need "deb-src" lines listed in your apt sources.

[atreyu]

If you just want to grab the source on a Debian based distro

apt-get source package-foo

Where "package-foo" substitute the relevant package name.

Note: -

You do not need to be root.

You need "deb-src" lines listed in your apt sources.

This is a cool capability, and one of the few things that I like about apt-get that is not available in yum (since I last tried anyway).

[Rubberman]

This is a cool capability, and one of the few things that I like about apt-get that is not available in yum (since I last tried anyway).

Actually it is, but usually you have to edit the .repo files in /etc/yum.repos.d to enable the source repositories. After that, it is trivial.

[atreyu]

Actually it is, but usually you have to edit the .repo files in /etc/yum.repos.d to enable the source repositories. After that, it is trivial.

Excellent...(said like Mr Burns while drumming fingers)
off to research yum...thanks for the tip, rubberman!