Directory Size Management

I’m in the process of organizing and backing up the rather large directory structure on my desktop box, in preparation to try out Windows 7 and Ubuntu Linux.

Until I finally buy a BD-R drive (which will probably happen sometime this year), this means backing up to DVD-R discs. My mail spool is no problem at 2.3GB or thereabouts, but the \docs directory is another story entirely. There is content in there — probably large, unused content — from at least as far back as the first Clinton administration. I don’t mind keeping old data around if it’s reasonably sized, but how to tell where the disk-hogging directories are?

Googling “directory tree size,” I came across WinDirStat. It’s a freeware application to scan a given directory structure and show how much is taken up by which subdirectories.

It also takes this data and maps it into pretty fractal pictures.

I’ll post my thoughts on Ubuntu and Windows 7 when I get to them. I may even try out the 64-bit version of XP, depending on how much I like or dislike Win7. (With 64-bit support and newer versions of DirectX, I *want* to like it — but I have concerns about the way the GUI has been evolving since Office 2007 and Vista.)

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6 Responses to Directory Size Management

  1. Anonymous says:

    Wow!! Why are you paying to advertise this blog?????

  2. M. Eric Carr says:

    Just as an experiment. It doesn't cost much, actually.

  3. Dosquatch says:

    Paying? What, playing with AdWords, are we?

  4. Dosquatch says:

    Holy Crap, I love this tool! "Why is the shared drive full?" now has a friggin' technicolor answer, with names to attach. "YOU! With the 7.3GB of publishing projects from the past 3 year's worth of students! Go archive something, please."

  5. The artist formerly known as HokiePoker says:

    So does this mean you found the quotes file somewhere? 🙂 -J

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