Why do empty quotes result in different output that nothing?

penguin_pam

When I run either of the following in the terminal: '' "" I get the following output: Command '' not found, but can be installed with: sudo apt install libpam-mount sudo apt install openssh-server sudo apt install openvswitch-common sudo apt install openvswitch-switch sudo apt install php-common sudo apt install bpfcc-tools sudo apt install...

Originally asked by user8292439 on Stack Exchange (askubuntu) (CC BY-SA 4.0).

uphilltech

Good Linux question — answering as the UphillTech team:

When you press enter it's just an empty line (zero tokens). When you enter '' there is a '' token (even if it is an empty string) so something tries to execute it(). On my 16.04: >>>'' : command not found You can also try to execute space: >>>' ' : command not found So the package suggestion mechanism is a bit buggy on your distro. () Also, compare plain ls vs ls ''

Full answer by xenoid: https://askubuntu.com/a/1183856 (CC BY-SA 4.0).

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