How do i find the biggest file in my directory?

anandv_1234 · 12-21-2007, 08:45 AM

Dear Folks,

My requirement is like this, in my folder i have lot of files
i have to find the biggest file. my folder contains lots of sub folders also......

i think i gave a clear picture about my requirment...

if any one knows, do send me a reply...

Thanks and Regards,
V.Anand,
Bangalore.

Nylex · 12-21-2007, 08:48 AM

Read the man page for ls and find the options you need to use.

jay73 · 12-21-2007, 08:59 AM

And the man pages for sort and head, too, while you're at it.

colucix · 12-21-2007, 09:12 AM

I'd opt for man pages of find, xargs, ls, head.

sadiqdm · 12-21-2007, 09:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by anandv_1234

Dear Folks,

My requirement is like this, in my folder i have lot of files
i have to find the biggest file. my folder contains lots of sub folders also......

i think i gave a clear picture about my requirment...

You could have given us some info about which Linux distro you are using, and also how big is your hard drive, etc.

If you are using the KDE desktop, then open the Start menu and click on Home to open the File Manager. Then click on the Size tab at the top of the second column twice, and a little black arrow should appear pointing up. This will sort directories and files with the biggest at the top. Now you just have to go through all the directories and sub-directories by hand.

A faster way would be to use Filelight - http://www.methylblue.com/filelight/

matthewg42 · 12-21-2007, 09:41 AM

You could view the directory using a GUI file manager like konqueror under KDE, nautilus under Gnome, Thunar under XFCE, select detailed listing and then sort on the size and look at the top/bottom of the list.

The same approach works for the ls program in the terminal - sort and take the top or bottom of the list.

From the ls manual page:

Quote:

-S sort by file size

What it doesn't say explicitly is that the list will be in descending order, so you can take the top of the list to see the largest (I just found it by trying it and seeing what order it was using).

This will just print the name of the largest file:

Code:

ls -S |head -1

Or if you want to see the details, add an l (lower case L):

Code:

ls -lS |head -1

jschiwal · 12-21-2007, 10:37 AM

Code:

find ./ -type f -printf "%s %p\n" | awk 'BEGIN {max=0} {
if ($1>max) {max=$1; maxfile=$2 }
}
END {print max maxfile}'

The find program will print the size of the largest file in the current directory and its subdirectories. The awk program will print out just the largest file.

Code:

ls -lR * | tr -s ' ' | sed -n '/^-/p' | cut -d' ' -f5,9 | sort -nr | head

This oneliner A) lists all of the files B) truncates the extra spaces B) filters out directories C) performs a reverse numeric sort D) prints out the first few lines.

If you have a large amount of files, "ls -lR" might fail. If that is the case, use the find command.

ghostdog74 · 12-21-2007, 10:58 AM

Code:

du -ab /path/*|sort -rn|head -1

ghostdog74 · 12-21-2007, 11:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matthewg42

This will just print the name of the largest file:

Code:

ls -S |head -1

if the requirement is to find the largest file including subfolders, then have to include -R and do some extra processing to get rid of extraneous lines.

Quote:

Or if you want to see the details, add an l (lower case L):

Code:

ls -lS |head -1

if the -l is added, then head -1 will give the "total <size>" string..got to get the second line instead.

Code:

# ls -lS| sed -n '2p'

jschiwal · 12-21-2007, 11:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ghostdog74

if the requirement is to find the largest file including subfolders, then have to include -R and do some extra processing to get rid of extraneous lines.

if the -l is added, then head -1 will give the "total <size>" string..got to get the second line instead.

Code:

# ls -lS| sed -n '2p'

Including the -R argument will cause each folder to list the largest files first, but won't list the largest file of all directories on the top.

Code:

du -ab /path/*|sort -rn|head -1

This has promise but will list a directories as well.

pwc101 · 12-21-2007, 12:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jschiwal

Code:

du -ab /path/*|sort -rn|head -1

This has promise but will list a directories as well.

Code:

find ./ -type f -exec du -ab {} \; | sort -rn | head -1

colucix · 12-21-2007, 12:58 PM

This should be a little faster

Code:

ls -asR | sort -n | tail -1

and to retrieve the full path

Code:

find . -name name_of_the_biggest_file