completely remove of useless files and configurations

ld_k · 06-25-2012, 11:39 AM

Is it possible to remove completely useless files and configurations ?
For example,I had installed before two years Kde and there are still files that I don't need...

I usually remove the no-needed programs via Synaptic.
After I run

PHP Code:



apt-get autoremove

I really need to freed some space.

Kustom42 · 06-25-2012, 11:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ld_k

Is it possible to remove completely useless files and configurations ?

There is no way a linux app can decide for you what is useless and what isn't. If you need more space start doing some du's to track down what is consuming the space, then use your own judgement to decide if you still need that application or not.

414N · 06-25-2012, 11:50 AM

You should only delete what you're absolutely sure isn't used anymore.
I don't believe configuration files are eating out your disk space, as they're often a few KB in size...
You could make use of JDiskReport (you need a Java runtime environment to use it) to sort out which directories are the most cumbersome.

honeybadger · 06-25-2012, 12:29 PM

Here is an idea. cd to /usr/share/doc/ and then use 'gzip -d -v *' this will zip all the txt and html files. Dont worry vim and links can open a ziped txt and html files respectively. You can also go to /usr/local/share/doc/ if you have installed any applications from source. This is _a lot_ better than deleteing any configuration files. Check /usr/share/linux and see if you have the source code for kernel. As far I can see it is mostly the header files for the kernel that are important and not the actual kernel sources. Also look into /var/log and see if there are some old files (like xorgconfig) that can be deleted.

cynwulf · 06-25-2012, 04:02 PM

Purge the package cache

Code:

# aptitude clean

Purge unneeded config files

Code:

# aptitude purge ~c

Install deborphan

Code:

# aptitude install deborphan

Have it check for orphaned packages

Code:

$ deborphan

If you're happy to remove the listed packages (i.e. you're certain you need none of them)

Code:

# aptitude purge `deborphan`

Or better still do this first

Code:

$ deborphan > ~/orphans.txt

That way if something breaks you can reinstall them.

Add local packages to a keep list to avoid deborphan removing them

Code:

$ deborphan -A package_foo

(where package_foo is the name of the package you want deborphan to stop reporting)

More info

Code:

$ man aptitude

Code:

$ man deborphan

craigevil · 06-25-2012, 04:10 PM

Debian Cleanup Tip #1: Get rid of useless configuration files - http://raphaelhertzog.com/2011/01/31...uration-files/

Mastering Debian and Ubuntu - http://raphaelhertzog.com/mastering-debian/
has several articles about cleaning up your system.

various ways to use deborphan

Code:

deborphan | xargs apt-get -y remove --purge
deborphan --guess-all | xargs apt-get -y remove --purge
deborphan --guess-dev | xargs apt-get -y remove --purge

debfoster is another useful apps for this purpose

Quote:

debfoster is a wrapper program for apt and dpkg. When first run, it
will ask you which of the installed packages you want to keep
installed.
.
After that, it maintains a list of packages that you want to have
installed on your system. It uses this list to detect packages that
have been installed only because other packages depended on them. If
one of these dependencies changes, debfoster will take notice, and
ask if you want to remove the old package.
.
This helps you to maintain a clean Debian install, without old
(mainly library) packages lying around that aren't used any more.

ld_k · 06-26-2012, 05:41 AM

I freed about 7GB.

Thanks!!