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PKG-SEARCH(8) System Manager's Manual PKG-SEARCH(8) NAME pkg search -- search package repository catalogues SYNOPSIS pkg search [-U] [-r reponame ...] [-S search] [-L label] [-Q query-modifier] [-Cegix] pattern pkg search [-cDdfopqRsU] [-r reponame ...] [-Cegix] pattern pkg search [--no-repo-update] [--repository reponame ...] [--search search] [--label label] [--query-modifier query-modifier] [--{case-sensitive,exact,glob,case-insensitive,regex}] pattern pkg search [--{comment,description,depends-on,full,origins,prefix}] [--{quiet,raw,size,no-repo-update}] [--repository reponame ...] [--{case-sensitive,exact,glob,case-insensitive,regex}] [--raw-format format] pattern DESCRIPTION pkg search searches the catalogue of packages available for installation. By default, pkg searches for case-sensitive package names from all enabled repos. Available packages can also be matched by comment, description, origin, or version. It returns the name, version, and comment by default, but any data available from the catalogue may be displayed. Package repository catalogues will be automatically updated whenever pkg search is run by a user ID with write access to the package database, un- less disabled by the -U flag or setting REPO_AUTOUPDATE to NO in pkg.conf(5). Package repositories are defined in the pkg.conf file or by creating repos- itory definitions in /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos. See pkg.conf(5) for de- tails. OPTIONS The following options are supported by pkg search: -C, --case-sensitive Make the exact (-e) or the regular expression (-x) matching against pkg-name case sensitive. This is the default, unless modified by setting CASE_SENSITIVE_MATCH to false in pkg.conf. -c, --comment Search for packages with comment text matching pattern. Equiv- alent to -S comment. -D, --description Search for packages with description text matching pattern. Equivalent to -S description. -d, --depends-on Display the list of packages depended on by each matched pack- age. Equivalent to -Q depends-on. -e, --exact pattern should be an exact match against the search field. -f, --full Show ``full'' information about the package. Equivalent to -Q full. -g, --glob Treat pattern as a shell globbing expression. The glob pattern must match the entire field being searched. -i, --case-insensitive Make the exact (-e) or regular expression (-x) matching against pattern case insensitive. -L label, --label label Select which identifying label is printed for each matched package, unless -q is used. Several different fields from the repository catalogue database may be used to search on, or to generate the label, as indicated by the label argument. See the ""Search and Label Options"" section for details. If un- specified, label is set to the same as the value searched via the -S search option. -o, --origins List packages by origin for each package matching pattern. Equivalent to -L origin. -p, --prefix Display the package installation prefix for each matched pack- age. Equivalent to -Q prefix. -q, --quiet Be "quiet". Produce less output. In particular do not show an identifying label field for each package. -Q query-modifier, --query-modifier query-modifier Modify the query output by adding an additional field to the result. Multiple fields can be added by using additional -Q query-modifier flags. See the ""Output Modifier Options"" sec- tion for details. -r reponame, --repository reponame Search for packages from only the named repository. This op- tion can be specified multiple times to use several reposito- ries. Packages will be searched from the named repositories only, irrespective of the configured "enabled" status from repo.conf. By default, catalogues for all enabled repositories are searched. -R, --raw Display the full manifest (raw) from the matching packages. -S search, --search search Specify the field to search the repository catalogue on. If unspecified, searches on pkg-name unless the search term con- tains a / character, when it searches on port origin. Output will be sorted in order of the search field. See the ""Search and Label Options"" sections for more details. --raw-format format Choose the format of the raw output. The format can be: json, json-compact, ucl, yaml (default). -s, --size Display the installed size of matched packages. Equivalent to -Q size. -U, --no-repo-update Suppress the automatic update of the local copy of the reposi- tory catalogue from remote. Automatic repository catalogue up- dates are only attempted when the effective UID of the process has write access to the package database. Otherwise they are silently ignored. -x, --regex Treat pattern as a regular expression according to the "modern" or "extended" syntax of re_format(7). This is the default. Matches any substring of the search field unless explicit be- ginning or ending anchor terms are used. Search and Label Options The following database fields (or composites of several fields) can be used both for searching for a match to the given pattern and as identifying la- bels for the block of output for each package. comment The one line comment field describing the port, derived from the COMMENT variable in the port's Makefile. When chosen as a label op- tion, the output format will additionally include the package name, equivalent to -L pkg-name -Q comment. When chosen as a search option, only the comment field is used for sorting the output. comment-description Both the one line comment and the multi-line description fields. When chosen as a search option, a package will match if pattern is found in either field. The output format will include the package name, comment and description. Results are sorted by comment. This option is only available as a search field (-S), not as a label option (-L). description The multi-line package description from the pkg-descr file in the port. This does include the WWW URL reference, if any, from that file. When chosen as a label option, the output format will additionally include the package name, equivalent to -L pkg-name -Q description. When cho- sen as a search option, only the description field is used for sorting the output. name The name of the package, derived from the PORTNAME variable in the port's Makefile. origin The port origin, in the format category/port, that the package was com- piled from. pkg-name The package name in the format name-version. The same as the PKGNAME variable in the port's Makefile. Any unambiguous prefix of the label name may be used on the command line. Thus -Sd, -S descr and -S description are all equivalent. Output Modifier Options Additional data from the repository catalogue to print for each matched package. Multiple output modifiers can be combined. Where more than one output field is required, either because multiple -Q query-modifier options were given, or one or more -Q query-modifier option was combined with the -L comment or -L description options, then each output field will be tagged with the field name. annotations Arbitrary text in tag-value format that can be added to any package. arch The architecture string indicating what OS version and CPU architecture the package is suitable for. For example, freebsd:9:x86:64 indicates a package suitable for FreeBSD 9.x running on an amd64 processor, while freebsd:* indicates an architecture independent package suitable for any version of FreeBSD. categories All categories, real and virtual, that the underlying package belongs to, derived from the CATEGORIES variable in the port's Makefile. comment The one line comment field describing the port, derived from the COMMENT variable in the port's Makefile. depends-on The list of packages the named package depends on. Dependency packages are listed in the format name-version one per line. If the port has no dependencies, nothing will be output for this field, including sup- pressing the tag name when multiple output fields are requested. description The multi-line package description from the pkg-descr file in the port. This does include the WWW URL reference, if any, from that file. full Show a standard set of fields, equivalent to a combination of the name, version, origin, prefix, repository, categories, license, maintainer, www, comment, options, shared-libs-required, shared-libs-provided, annotations, size, pkg-size and descr fields, in that order. licenses Displays a list of all the licenses the package is released under on a single line. Where more than one license applies, indicate if the terms of all licenses should apply (&) or if one or more licenses may be selected out of those available (|). maintainer Display the maintainer's e-mail address. name Display the port name, which is derived from the PORTNAME variable in the port's Makefile. options Displays a list of the port options and their state (on or off) when the package was built. If the package does not have any options to set, nothing will be output for this field, including suppressing the tag name when multiple output fields are requested. pkg-size Display the size of the compressed package tarball, i.e., how much would need to be downloaded from the repository. prefix Display the installation prefix for the package, usually /usr/local. repository Displays the repository name and the corresponding base URL for the repository. For a default repository defined in pkg.conf. required-by Displays all of the packages in the repository that require the named package as a dependency. Dependency packages are listed in the format name-version one per line. If no other packages require the named package, nothing will be output for this field, including suppressing the tag name when multiple output fields are requested. shared-libs-required If the package contains dynamically linked FreeBSD ELF binaries, dis- play a list of all of the shared libraries other than those from the base system required for those binaries to run. Shared libraries for foreign (e.g., Linux) binaries run under emulation will not be dis- played. If the package does not require any shared libraries, nothing will be output for this field including suppressing the tag name when multiple fields are requested. shared-libs-provided If the package contains any shared libraries, display a list of the li- brary names, including the ABI version number, if any. A shared li- brary, of either the same or differing ABI versions, may legitimately be provided by more than installed package, but this frequently indi- cates a problem. size Display the total amount of filesystem space the package files will take up once unpacked and installed. url Display the URL that would be used to download the package from the repository. version Display the package version, which is derived from the PKGVERSION vari- able in the port's Makefile. www Display the general URL, if any, for the project developing the soft- ware used in the package. This is extracted from the pkg-descr file in the port. Any unambiguous prefix of the query modifier name may be used on the com- mand line. Thus -Qm, -Q maint and -Q maintainer are all equivalent, but you need to use at least -Q si and -Q sh to distinguish size from shared-libs-required or shared-libs-provided, and you'll need at least -Q shared-libs-p to select the shared-libs-provided unambiguously. ENVIRONMENT The following environment variables affect the execution of pkg search. See pkg.conf(5) for further description. PKG_DBDIR CASE_SENSITIVE_MATCH FILES See pkg.conf(5). SEE ALSO pkg_checksum(3), pkg_create(3), pkg_printf(3), pkg_repo_create(3), pkg_re- pos(3), pkg-keywords(5), pkg-lua-script(5), pkg-repository(5), pkg- script(5), pkg-triggers(5), pkg.conf(5), pkg(8), pkg-add(8), pkg-alias(8), pkg-annotate(8), pkg-audit(8), pkg-autoremove(8), pkg-check(8), pkg-check- sum(8), pkg-clean(8), pkg-config(8), pkg-create(8), pkg-delete(8), pkg- fetch(8), pkg-help(8), pkg-info(8), pkg-install(8), pkg-key(8), pkg- lock(8), pkg-plugins(8), pkg-query(8), pkg-register(8), pkg-repo(8), pkg- repositories(8), pkg-rquery(8), pkg-rwhich(8), pkg-set(8), pkg-shell(8), pkg-shlib(8), pkg-ssh(8), pkg-stats(8), pkg-triggers(8), pkg-unregister(8), pkg-update(8), pkg-updating(8), pkg-upgrade(8), pkg-version(8), pkg- which(8) FreeBSD ports 15.quarterly May 26, 2026 PKG-SEARCH(8)
NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | ENVIRONMENT | FILES | SEE ALSO
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