Updatedb: can not open a temporary file for `/var/lib/mlocate/mlocate.db’

locateupdatedb

I go to use the updatedb command to update the index and I get

updatedb: can not open a temporary file for `/var/lib/mlocate/mlocate.db'

fyi The locate command is working, e.g.

$ locate Index.xml
/usr/share/mysql/charsets/Index.xml
durrantm.../durrantm$

How can I overcome this issue when trying to run updatedb?

You have to run the updatedb command as the super user. For example,

sudo updatedb

Yes, you can use xargs for this.

For example a simple:

$ locate commands.cfg | xargs grep check_dns

(When grep sees multiple files it searches in each one and enables filename printing along matches.)

Or you can explicitly enable filename printing via:

$ locate commands.cfg | xargs grep -H check_dns

(Just in case one grep is called only with 1 argument by xargs)

For programs that only accept one filename argument (unlike grep) you can restrict the number of supplied arguments like this:

$ locate commands.cfg | xargs -n1 grep check_dns

That does not print the names of files where matched lines are from.

The result is equivalent to:

$ locate commands.cfg | xargs grep -h check_dns

With a modern locate/xargs you can also protect against whitespace issues:

$ locate -0 commands.cfg | xargs -0 grep -H check_dns

(By default whitespace separates input of xargs - which is of course a problem when your filenames contain whitespace ...)

The command is:

sudo updatedb

See man updatedb for more details.