running out of space on root disc
 

Hi!

I keep running out of space on dev/hda6 (my root partition)
I have it set to 16 GB, I use max 3GB for my stuff, the fresh installation only took up abut 3GB. I did install a bunch more packages, but I don't think that's 10GB worth!
Are there any temp directories I can delete? How do I find them?

thanks!

du -sh <dir> will show you how big <dir> is. You can use it to search for big files.

Check the size of /tmp and better yet /var/log

thanks, I get:
7.8G /root --> there are no files in there that could add up that much!
3.7G /home/ --> same here, I have a max of 1.5GB in there, not 3.7!!?

I never use /root, I have no idea why it is that large??

# cd /root
# ls -la

will reveal all...

try

#du -h --max-depth=1 <dir>

thanks, but that still doesn't add up to 7.8GB !??

-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 55 2006-04-19 06:46 .DCOPserver_wildblue__1
-rw------- 1 root root 1546 2006-07-02 22:32 .ICEauthority
-rw------- 1 root root 0 2006-06-03 13:32 .Xauthority
-rw------- 1 root root 12872 2006-07-02 22:33 .bash_history
-rw------- 1 root root 26 2006-04-19 06:46 .dmrc
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 2006-06-01 22:21 .fonts.cache-1
drwx------ 4 root root 200 2006-04-19 06:46 .kde
-rw------- 1 root root 160 2006-04-19 06:46 .kderc
drwx------ 3 root root 72 2006-04-02 13:06 .local
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 112 2006-04-02 09:46 .mcop
-rw------- 1 root root 31 2006-06-30 17:35 .mcoprc
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 72 2006-04-30 20:04 .mplayer
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 176 2006-06-03 13:18 .qt
drwx------ 4 root root 96 2006-04-17 16:42 .thumbnails
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 168 2006-05-06 21:05 .xine
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 536 2006-03-30 06:23 .xinitrc
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 168 2006-04-02 14:30 .xmms
-rw------- 1 root root 1869 2006-06-03 13:32 .xsession-errors
-rw------- 1 root root 22638 2006-04-19 16:45 .xsession-errors-:1
drwx------ 2 root root 176 2006-04-19 06:46 Desktop
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1808 2002-04-16 21:21 loadlin16c.txt
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 97874 2002-04-16 21:20 loadlin16c.zip

The presence of these directories tell me that you have logged into KDE as root at least once.

Maybe you downloaded something to the desktop while you were there?

su -sm /* | sort -g

And then the same for the biggest dirs, e.g.
su -sm /usr/* | sort -g


Cheers,
Tink

All those hidden directories fill up with all sorts of nonsense. I bet you've been using root as your normal user.

.thumbnails will fill up with thumbnail images of ANY image you've ever seen in a file browser or file viewing application. You can usually safely delete it's contents but I haven't yet found a way to stop certain apps from regenerating them. .mplayer and .xine will fill up with playlists and all sorts of other junk.

.xsession-errors will probably be full of crash reports etc. from programs that you've run under X.

Additionally, Desktop is a nightmare if you are used to saving things on the desktop from Windows.

First, STOP USING ROOT as a normal account. That sort of accumulation only really happens in /root if someone's been logged in as root. Everything else tends to write to the filesystem in general (even X etc.).

Second, trimming the filesystem is an important skill, knowing what to delete and what not to. Do familiarise yourself with the du etc. commands so that this is not a problem. Find a nice spot to throw stuff until you are sure the system works without it (I have a habit of using /lost+found but that's not the best way to do it. a directory in the root or in /tmp is probably better), move anything you don't think you need there, then test the system with a reboot, login, etc. to check things still work before you rm them.

This also goes for finding the proper places to save things to. Don't use the crap My Documents/Desktop setup of Windows - you have a homedir and that's where you stick ALL your files. If you want a shortcut on the desktop, make a SHORTCUT (symlink), not a copy of the file. When you start to admin machines you quickly find people who use the Desktop as a filesystem in itself - don't. It decreases performance on certain setups (those that have to transmit user profiles etc.), it's easy to accidentally move/delete stuff on there, it makes backing up harder if personal files are spread everywhere and have multiple copies.

By default, 5% of any filesystem is set aside PURELY for root to use. No other user has access to that 5%. If you fill up the disk as a user, you don't need to worry becuase root will always have enough space to get stuff done (move files about, run programs etc.). If you fill up root's allocation, though, you could run into a lot more hassle to clear it up.

thank you, good info! I found the trash directories which were filled to the brim!
/root/.local/share/trash
that fixed it! plenty space now..:D :D :D

And are you heeding the warning NOT to run as root?


Cheers,
Tink

I guess you were talking of du:
If you have a recent KDE, there is a usefull view: In konqueror, use File Size View.

In deed :}

Old age doesn't protect from fat fingers!


Cheers,
Tink

P.S. Slackware doesn't automatically purge /tmp. We had a thread (maybe more than one!) on this. Most of the guys just write their own script to clean up while shutting down.

Conversely, OpenBSD cleans /tmp on the way up. That makes sense for diagnosis since you can boot a live CD and look at /tmp if you haven't restarted.

I like my init to run fast so I clean up on shutdown.