how to free up space on my hard drive?

beny2 · 10-04-2009, 09:27 AM

Tried to delete files from a partition who got full.
used rm, check with df -h, and du. They show different sizes
If I reboot, the df and du will match

Code:

shell# df -h /home
Filesystem                      Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol05 3.9G 3.9G 0     100% /home

Code:

shell# du -h -s * | sort -k1 -g -r | grep home
1.6G home

Is there any command I can use to clear the space without restarting the system.
Any suggestion will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

kbp · 10-05-2009, 02:11 AM

I usually trust 'df' to give accurate results, results will be updated as soon as you free up some space. A restart is not required for the space to become available

cheers

beny2 · 10-06-2009, 09:18 AM

Thanks for your reply.
I did trust the df too till when I was deleting files the df wasn't updating the size left.
The du helped to see the right size.
As I explained the partition will stay full after removing files.
Still unclear why this behavior. And to get the free space back, I had to reboot the system.
I am looking for a command to replace rebooting the system to clear the space.

okcomputer44 · 10-06-2009, 06:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by beny2

Thanks for your reply.
As I explained the partition will stay full after removing files.

I think you didn't remove more than 1% of the files and the df can't show any different if it less than that.

So it has to be removed more than 39Mb files.

Laz.

chrism01 · 10-06-2009, 08:38 PM

See post #4 here: http://www.unix.com/unix-advanced-ex...nt-output.html