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I'm trying to download a torrent, and Transmission bittorrent isn't showing up on the list of programs to run the file with, and I don't know where to locate it.

mikewhatever
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user174601
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  • possible duplicate of [Where is the default folder for Apps?](http://askubuntu.com/questions/60826/where-is-the-default-folder-for-apps) This can also help: http://askubuntu.com/questions/122930/how-to-make-firefox-open-magnet-links-in-transmission – Esso Jul 12 '13 at 13:28
  • I voted to close as duplicate, but I think my answer might fit on the other question. If it gets closed, please merge my answer into the other question. Thanks. – RobotHumans Jul 13 '13 at 00:13

3 Answers3

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Usually, the binaries of the programs that you download are located in /usr/bin, along with some other directories that could hold these binaries. You can tackle this through several ways.

Short Answer:

Transmission is located in /usr/bin/transmission-gtk.

Long Answer:

I'm no expert in this, but here's how I would go about locating where transmission is:

  1. First, you need to know what exactly is the name of the application, the name of the binary, because it might not be a straight-forward transmission. So, you could simply do ls -l /usr/bin | grep transmission. This will output all the files that have transmission in them. When I execute that command, I get this:

    alaa@aa-lu:~$ ls /usr/bin | grep transmission
transmission-cli
transmission-create
transmission-edit
transmission-gtk
transmission-remote
transmission-show

    gtk usually denotes that this is a "graphical" program, so there you have it, Transmission is located in /usr/bin and it called transmission-gtk. So, browse to that file when you're opening your torrent file, and it should work.

  2. If you don't get any output from the above ls command, then transmission might not be installed in the first place. You can check if it's installed by using dpkg:

    alaa@aa-lu:~$ dpkg -l | grep transmission
ii  transmission-cli                          2.77-0ubuntu1                          i386         lightweight BitTorrent client (command line programs)
ii  transmission-common                       2.77-0ubuntu1                          all          lightweight BitTorrent client (common files)
ii  transmission-gtk                          2.77-0ubuntu1                          i386         lightweight BitTorrent client (GTK interface)

    This tells me that transmission-gtk is infact installed.

  3. If you didn't find it in /usr/bin, you can use the command whereis transmission-gtk

    alaa@aa-lu:~$ whereis transmission-gtk
transmission-gtk: /usr/bin/transmission-gtk /usr/bin/X11/transmission-gtk /usr/share/man/man1/transmission-gtk.1.gz

    Ignore the other two locations.

Alaa Ali
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    You can also just run `whereis ` – Esso Jul 12 '13 at 13:31
  • @Esso, yup, was about to add it. I also want to add `dkpg -L`, or that he can look in `/usr/share/applications`, but I think it would be going too far =), and turns out it's a duplicate. – Alaa Ali Jul 12 '13 at 13:39
  • Good answer, but I don't think that the `whereis` addition is particularly useful. The thing is, in this particular case, you actually need to know that it's transmission-gtk, and not transmision, transmission-bt, transmission-qt, or transmission-something-else. Actually running `whereis ` for transmission, returns something irrelevant to the executable. – mikewhatever Jul 12 '13 at 18:21
  • Yes, that's why in step 1, I mentioned that "_you need to know what exactly is the name of the application_" =). The steps were meant to be followed in order. (1) Find the name of the application, then (2) search in `/usr/bin`, and if not present, (3) search for the binary using `whereis`, and if not present, (4) do a `dpkg -L transmission-gtk` or look for what's being executed in the `/usr/share/application` entry. – Alaa Ali Jul 12 '13 at 18:58
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Should be /usr/bin/transmission-gtk for Ubuntu.

PS: In case you have a different version, let us know.

mikewhatever
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1

which my-random-command in this case substitute transmission-gtk for my-random-command. Listing and grepping is bad for people that might have user based installs of things that are in their PATH, but not in the /usr/bin or /usr/local/bin you would expect...say for example ~/bin.

RobotHumans
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