[conspire] (forw) Re: hi again - next - how to cleanup/remove unused files

[Rick Moen]

----- Forwarded message from Tom Bergstrom <tbergsstudio at yahoo.com> -----

Date: Sat, 15 May 2010 11:28:17 -0700 (PDT)
From: Tom Bergstrom <tbergsstudio at yahoo.com>
To: Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com>
Subject: hi again - next - how to cleanup/remove unused files
X-Mailer: YahooMailClassic/10.1.11 YahooMailWebService/0.8.103.269680

Hi and Thanks Rick for getting Cinelarra to work,

Next how to cleanup/remove unused files.
I have a utility that is supposed to cleanup old unused files, but is this a good thing or is there another way?

Tom
PS: I'm thinking about stopping by on the 22nd or in June.

----- End forwarded message -----
----- Forwarded message from Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com> -----

Date: Sat, 15 May 2010 12:38:23 -0700
From: Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com>
To: Tom Bergstrom <tbergsstudio at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: hi again - next - how to cleanup/remove unused files
Organization: If you lived here, you'd be $HOME already.

Quoting Tom Bergstrom (tbergsstudio at yahoo.com):

> Hi and Thanks Rick for getting Cinelarra to work,
> 
> Next how to cleanup/remove unused files.
> I have a utility that is supposed to cleanup old unused files, but is
> this a good thing or is there another way?

I've never heard of such a utility being needed or useful.  Which old,
unused files would those be?  What directories, and produced how?

Basically, this sounds to me like a solution in search of a problem.  
Or perhaps a better way to say that is that it sounds redundant to
what's already built into your system:  Normally on a Unix system, files
that tend to grow such as logfiles (in /var/log) are kept under control
by nightly automatic maintenance scripts ('logrotate scripts').
Temporary files that accumulate in /tmp are pruned by a similar nightly
maintenance script, often called tmpreaper.  (Many systems instead have
a tmpreaper utility for the purpose written in C and installed as a
binary executable.  E.g., my Debian system has one as
/usr/sbin/tmpreaper , for which directories to be pruned get specified
in /etc/tmpreaper.conf .)


Unneeded/unwanted files could, I suppose, accumulate in your home
directory if you let them, but you can and should stay on top of that,
on your own.

It might be that I'm missing something in this picture.  For example, it
might be that a video production utility leaves old working files around
somewhere peculiar, in which case you might want to have a simple cron
(periodic) script that automatically runs periodically and deletes 
files that haven't been touched in seven days.

> Tom PS: I'm thinking about stopping by on the 22nd or in June.

We'd be glad to see you.

----- End forwarded message -----