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you're not giving us much information.

I have already tried sudo apt-get install ros-melodic-perception-pcl but it still does not show up

Did the package install? Did you get any errors? Something else? What is "it" here?

What is the output of dpkg -l | grep perception-pcl?

After source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash, what is the output of rospack find perception_pcl?

I am trying to visualize pcd files and have been following this thread here to do it however I am not able to find the perception_pcl command [..]

Please note: pcd_viewer would be the tool. pcl_perception is the package (which hosts the tool).

You cannot execute pcl_perception. Only pcd_viewer.

you're not giving us much information.

I have already tried sudo apt-get install ros-melodic-perception-pcl but it still does not show up

Did the package install? Did you get any errors? Something else? What is "it" here?

What is the output of dpkg -l | grep perception-pcl?

After source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash, what is the output of rospack find perception_pcl?

I am trying to visualize pcd files and have been following this thread here to do it however I am not able to find the perception_pcl command [..]

Please note: pcd_viewer would be the tool. pcl_perception is the package (which hosts the tool).

You cannot execute pcl_perception. Only pcd_viewer.

Edit: pcd_viewer has not been part of perception_pcl since at least Hydro.

The tool is now called pcl_viewer and is part of the (stand-alone) PCL package: pcl-tools (at least on Debian/Ubuntu). It's not part of ROS.

See #q80836. The OP there answers his own question and states something similar.

Where in the ros.org would i have needed to go to find this bit of info?

I'm not sure this is a "ROS thing".

Please note that PCL is a stand-alone library. It's not a piece of ROS. There are packages that let you use it with ROS, but it's completely stand-alone, and it's development also happens outside of the ROS community.

The Q&A you linked is 8 years old. PCL has moved on, answers get stale. The wiki page you linked also makes no mention of the tool. Nor do any of the other pages about PCL-related packages (such as pcl_ros).

Original answer:

you're not giving us much information.

I have already tried sudo apt-get install ros-melodic-perception-pcl but it still does not show up

Did the package install? Did you get any errors? Something else? What is "it" here?

What is the output of dpkg -l | grep perception-pcl?

After source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash, what is the output of rospack find perception_pcl?

I am trying to visualize pcd files and have been following this thread here to do it however I am not able to find the perception_pcl command [..]

Please note: pcd_viewer would be the tool. pcl_perception is the package (which hosts the tool).

You cannot execute pcl_perception. Only pcd_viewer.

Edit: pcd_viewer has not been part of perception_pcl since at least Hydro.

The tool is now called pcl_viewer and is part of the (stand-alone) PCL package: pcl-tools (at least on Debian/Ubuntu). It's not part of ROS.

See #q80836. The OP there answers his own question and states something similar.

Where in the ros.org would i have needed to go to find this bit of info?

I'm not sure this is a "ROS thing".

Please note that PCL is a stand-alone library. It's not a piece of ROS. There are packages that let you use it with ROS, but it's completely stand-alone, and it's development also happens outside of the ROS community.

The Q&A you linked is 8 years old. PCL has moved on, answers get stale. The wiki page you linked also makes no mention of the tool. Nor do any of the other pages about PCL-related packages (such as pcl_ros).

Original answer:

you're not giving us much information.

I have already tried sudo apt-get install ros-melodic-perception-pcl but it still does not show up

Did the package install? Did you get any errors? Something else? What is "it" here?

What is the output of dpkg -l | grep perception-pcl?

After source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash, what is the output of rospack find perception_pcl?

I am trying to visualize pcd files and have been following this thread here to do it however I am not able to find the perception_pcl command [..]

Please note: pcd_viewer would be the tool. pcl_perception is the package (which hosts the tool).

You cannot execute pcl_perception. Only pcd_viewer.

Edit: pcd_viewer has not been part of perception_pcl since at least Hydro.

The tool is now called pcl_viewer and is part of the (stand-alone) PCL package: pcl-tools (at least on Debian/Ubuntu). It's not part of ROS.

See #q80836. The OP there answers his own question and states something similar.

Where in the ros.org would i have needed to go to find this bit of info?

I'm not sure this is a "ROS thing".

Please note that PCL is a stand-alone library. It's not a piece of ROS. There are packages that let you use it with ROS, but it's completely stand-alone, and it's development also happens outside of the ROS community.

The Q&A you linked is 8 years old. PCL has moved on, answers get stale. The wiki page you linked also makes no mention of the tool. Nor do any of the other pages about PCL-related packages (such as pcl_ros).

perception_pcl is actually a metapackage that facilitates installation of all ROS PCL wrapping packages. See the wiki page. It being a metapackage also explains why there isn't much content: it doesn't contain any nodes, messages or other ROS-related infrastructure.

Edit 2: I've updated the pcl_perception wiki page (diff) to point readers to pcl_ros and make it clear that package is just a metapackage. Not something that contains any code, libraries or nodes.

Original answer:

you're not giving us much information.

I have already tried sudo apt-get install ros-melodic-perception-pcl but it still does not show up

Did the package install? Did you get any errors? Something else? What is "it" here?

What is the output of dpkg -l | grep perception-pcl?

After source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash, what is the output of rospack find perception_pcl?

I am trying to visualize pcd files and have been following this thread here to do it however I am not able to find the perception_pcl command [..]

Please note: pcd_viewer would be the tool. pcl_perception is the package (which hosts the tool).

You cannot execute pcl_perception. Only pcd_viewer.