Removing Temporary Files

coolamit78 · 09-14-2003, 09:24 AM

I have Redhat 8.0 with KDE.

I read somewhere that as a Linux user, one must keep an eye on the size of temporary files building inside the root directory.

I noticed that there are 2 directories that store temporary files -

/tmp and /var/tmp

My question is -

Do the /tmp and /var/tmp contain important data?

or Will it be safe to delete the entire contents of these two directories like the c:\temp and c:\windows\temp directories under MS Windows?

Please clarify.

trickykid · 09-14-2003, 10:23 AM

It is safe to remove temporary files from your tmp directorys.

Most will have these dumped or removed at boot time. It's sometimes safer though to remove them while not in X, as if your in X and remove the files, you might remove something important then, like an application open, etc.

unSpawn · 09-15-2003, 04:22 AM

There's apps like "tmpwatch" to help you automagically remove "old" tempfiles 'n stuff.

gbell72 · 09-16-2003, 04:26 PM

You could also set yourself up some cron jobs like this instead of having to download and install a new app:
0 3 * * * /usr/bin/find /tmp -atime +7 \
-exec /bin/rm -rf {} \; 2> /dev/null

0 3 * * * /usr/bin/find /var/temp -atime +7 \
-exec /bin/rm -f {} \; 2> /dev/null

Jeff Foster · 09-17-2003, 03:22 PM

Aren't those removed by the "make clean" command?

Mara · 09-17-2003, 03:40 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Jeff Foster
Aren't those removed by the "make clean" command?

No, 'make clean' usually removes all .o and such from the directories you compile a program. I don't remember any Makefile that deletes something in /tmp.