Command line: How does mdfind compare to locate?

[Oneechan69]

mdfind and locate are both CLIs for searching files on Mac. mdfind uses the Mac's spotlight index for searching while locate uses its own. To manually update locate's index you need to run /usr/libexec/locate.updatedb. If you have used both, how do they compare, is one better than the other?

 

[zevrix]

mdfind and locate are both CLIs for searching files on Mac. mdfind uses the Mac's spotlight index for searching while locate uses its own. To manually update locate's index you need to run /usr/libexec/locate.updatedb. If you have used both, how do they compare, is one better than the other?

I never used it but if you read the BUGS section of the man page for locate then it doesn't look like it's a reliable way to look for files. By default this database doesn't even exist on my Mac - has to be generated first:

WARNING: The locate database (/var/db/locate.database) does not exist. To create the database, run the following command: sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.locate.plist Please be aware that the database can take some time to generate; once the database has been created, this message will no longer appear.

 

[Brian33]

I haven't used locate. But from what I can tell, it only searches a database of pathnames. It doesn't index anything within a file, as far as I can tell.

The Spotlight database indexes the contents of files (and I guess the file and pathnames, also).

So that's a pretty big difference.

 

[gilby101]

I have always assumed (but can't find a reference) that locate is present in macOS just for POSIX compliance. As such it is mainly of historical interest.

mdfind and locate are both CLIs for searching files on Mac

You might be better comparing mdfind with find. Both are actively used, particularly find, in command scripts.

 

[frou]

I have always assumed (but can't find a reference) that locate is present in macOS just for POSIX compliance.

I don't think it's actually required by POSIX but indeed it's probably there as an old Unix thing that users at some point in the past had the expectation of being able to use.