prevent bash to make suggestions for unknown commands (similar commands or apt packages)

Question

On some Linux installations, there is a 'feature' in which bash automatically suggests similar commands or apt packages when you type a command which is not found on the path.

I find it very annoying, as this takes several seconds and blocks the terminal.

Where is this configured (bash, Ubuntu)? Where can I change/disable this? I just want the errormessage of an unknown command and nothing more.

Cannot find anything inside ~/.bashrc .

This is the output (takes 10 seconds) on my corporate machine, shortened:

> eco 'hello world'

Command 'eco' not found, did you mean:

  command 'ecj' from deb ecj (3.16.0-1)
  command 'ecc' from deb ecere-dev (0.44.15-1build3)
[...]
  command 'co' from deb rcs (5.9.4-6)
  command 'ico' from deb x11-apps (7.7+8)
  command 'peco' from deb peco (0.5.1-1)
  command 'ecm' from deb gmp-ecm (7.0.4+ds-5)

Try: apt install <deb name>

> 

Answer 1

On Debian (and Ubuntu etc), this is done by the command-not-found package. To stop it, remove the package.

apt-get purge command-not-found

IIRC, you will have to exit and restart your current shell (or logout and login again, or reboot) for the command_not_found_handle function to be reset after you remove the package. Or just run unset -f command_not_found_handle in every running interactive shell (e.g. every tab in your terminal emulator).

BTW:

Package: command-not-found
Version: 23.04.0-1
Installed-Size: 522
Maintainer: Julian Andres Klode <jak@debian.org>
Architecture: all
Depends: apt-file (>= 3.0~exp1~), lsb-release, python3-apt, python3:any
Suggests: snapd
Description-en: Suggest installation of packages in interactive bash sessions
 This package will install a handler for command_not_found that looks up
 programs not currently installed but available from the repositories.

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PS: You're not the only one who finds this annoying. I uninstall it from every system I build. I purge the bash-completion package too, I find the restrictions and delays caused by custom completions to be far more annoying than the benefits.