How to locate a package that provides a specific file

It happens usually that I need a specific file and I have to find out which package provides it. Some package managers, such as yum (Fedora, Red Hat and its derivatives) and urpm (Mandriva, Mageia, blackPanther OS), have built-in action for that purpose. Aptitude and apt-get do not have. :( There are, however, some tools in Debian that search in the content of any packages. dpkg -S, e.g., does that job, however it works only for packages already installed on your system. Other tools, such as apt-file and wajig does not have this limitation. Because of some reason, I prefer apt-file. So, let's see how it works.

How to get rid of LaTeX-beamer font size warnings

Using LaTeX Beamer I always got the following warning:

LaTeX Font Warning: Font shape `T1/cmss/m/n’ in size <4> not available
LaTeX Font Warning: Size substitutions with differences


Apparently, the compiled pdf was O.K., but the waning always made me uneasy. I just could not be reconciled. It turned out that Beamer defines \Tiny and \TINY font sizes that some fonts do not provide. Using a font package such as lmodern that provides these sizes solves the problem.


source

How to install packages fast from command line - updated

I prefer using command line for installing packages. I think it is easier, faster and makes me feel a geek. :) Anyway, typing always apt-get install/remove/update or aptitude install/remove/whatever is not too convenient and takes too much time. This is where aliases come into the picture. In my .bash_aliases file (/home/username/.bash_aliases), I defined the following aliases:

Search with "locate" in /media

By default, updatedb neglects partitions mounted in /media. However, it could be really useful if locate worked on those partitions as well. Especially, if you mount the partitions of your HDDs there (that is a common practice nowadays). If you want to change this behaviour, just remove /media from PRUNEPATHS settings in /etc/updatedb.conf (as a root of course). Note, however, that it is much better to mount the partitions of your HDDs into /mnt and use /media just for removable devices.

Mounting iPhone/iPod touch with iOS 4.3

Mounting Apple's products in Linux is not as straightforward as it should be. I have an iPod Touch 3G. It has iOS 4.3. The problem is that the libimobiledevice1 package in the Squeeze repos are too old and cannot handle that version of iOS. Forunately, the latest stable release of libimobiledevice can do that (I have not tested with iOS 5.0). In order to compile and install it you need the build dependencies of libimobiledevice1 first:

# apt-get build-dep libimobiledevice1

How to install razor-qt in Debian Squeeze

According to its developers, Razor-qt is an advanced, easy-to-use, and fast desktop environment based on Qt. It works fine with weak machines, and contains most of the necessary DE components:

A note on \cite completion in vim latexsuite

vim latexuite has a built in \cite completion feature (and a lot more nice stuff). According to its documentation, by pressing F9 inside a \cite{} environment, the list of bibliography items should appear. For me, it did not work because of two reasons.