[Bug 382330] Re: mlocate can't search from database file for unmounted drive

[Dave Duback]

Yes, I have confirmed this, for Ubuntu 13.04 and mlocate 0.25.

I found that the PRUNEPATHS variable in /etc/updatedb.conf includes
/media. For me, the default mount point for a USB device with a label
(hard drive OR stick) is /media/dave/{disk label} with me as user dave.
I removed '/media' from PRUNEPATHS in /etc/updatedb.conf and now get the
proper results when searching databases for devices not currently
mounted.

The trick here will be making sure a device is not mounted to /media at
the time the cron job for updatedb runs, or find a way to run mlocate
without a check for the current existence of a path before reporting a
result. In the source for mlocate version 0.25, the implication is that
-e (check for existence) defaults to FALSE but this was not EXPLICIT in
the declaration.

The PRUNEPATHS variable is stored in the header of a .db file. The
anamoly seems to be if you specify /media/user/usbdrive as the root for
updatedb (updatedb -U /media/user/usbdrive), and /media is in PRUNEPATHS
at that time, the database is generated correctly (all files
catalogged), but subsequent searches fail if /media is in
/etc/updatedb.conf.

Again, when I removed '/media' from PRUNEPATHS in /etc/updatedb.conf, my
existing set of nineteen databases scanned from mount points
/media/dave/{disk label} is properly scanned.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/382330

Title:
  mlocate can't search from database file for unmounted drive

Status in “mlocate” package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  Binary package hint: mlocate

  I built a database file using updatedb. I then unmounted the drive and tried to search that file using the command
  sudo locate -d extwd -i *.mp3

  This yielded no results. By chance I tried the exact same command
  later and it worked because the drive was mounted. It appears as
  though the -e option were being implemented.

  Please see this thread for reference:
  http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1174996

  I'm using Ubuntu 64-bit 9.04.
  version of mlocate: 0.21.1

  Thank you.

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