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Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2006 10:11 pm Post subject: Partition size question

As I mentioned in my other topic a few months ago, I've had an ongoing project to convert my Windows 2000 file server to a linux one (specifically, running Ubuntu 6.06).

I think I finally have it working, but something very strange is happening, and I hope someone here can shed some light on it for me.

One of the original (NTFS) partitions is a 60GB partition that reports just over 19GB free. If I do a properties on the files/folders in that partition, I'm using just over 34GB of the partition. No problem.

So I created a new 60GB partition on the server (in EXT3), and copied all the files from the NTFS partition in question to the new one.

This is where it gets weird - it just almost ran out of space.

Ubuntu is reporting that the drive is 95% full, to the point of even saying that while it's a 60GB partition, there's only 5GB free.

But if I do a properties of the files/folders in that partition, it agrees with Windows - there are 34GB of files there.

How did I manage to lose 20GB of space???

Don't get me wrong, I happen to have a spare 120GB drive sitting here, just begging for me to put it in the server, and use that drive EXCLUSIVELY for the data previously on the 60GB drive.

But just the same, I'd really like to know why I'm having this problem.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Guide Dog Joined: 08 Nov 2003 Posts: 8131 Location: MN

well first off, are your 34 gigs of files all there? and what else did ubunto install?

on th elinux box df will show you info for the whole partition,

"du --max-depth=1" will show you the info for each folder in what ever directory your in... if ubunto installed 20 GB's of worthless packages then that would be where the problem is... though if your 34 GB's ballooned up 20 GB's I'd say that something got coppied wrong... look and see where the GB's are going on the linux box.

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2006 12:14 pm Post subject:

anglachel wrote:
well first off, are your 34 gigs of files all there? and what else did ubunto install?

on th elinux box df will show you info for the whole partition,

"du --max-depth=1" will show you the info for each folder in what ever directory your in... if ubunto installed 20 GB's of worthless packages then that would be where the problem is... though if your 34 GB's ballooned up 20 GB's I'd say that something got coppied wrong... look and see where the GB's are going on the linux box.

Well, if I go into Nautilus and go to that folder, and select all folders/files and right-click and do Properties, it does confirm that there are 34GB of files there (the number of files matches too, I just don't recall that exact number off-hand).

But when I go into the Disk manager and go to that partition, it confirms that it's a 60GB partition, but that only 5GB is free.

Here's all the gruesome details:

When I ran df, it reported (for the partition in question):
Total: 61931264
Used: 57723400
Available: 1061944

When I use nautilus to navigate into the shared folder itself, and select all folders/files and right-click and do properties, it reports:
7709 items, 34.7 GB

When I go up a level, so I can select just the shared folder, and right-click and do Properties on that, I get:
7825 items, 34.7 GB

Any ideas?

The only idea I have left, is I'm going to try deleting everything from that folder (partition), since I still have a copy of the data on the NTFS version of the partition. Once the new partition is "empty", I'll check how much space is really used. Maybe I need to simply reformat it or something.

Guide Dog Joined: 08 Nov 2003 Posts: 8131 Location: MN

Alphi wrote:
anglachel wrote:
well first off, are your 34 gigs of files all there? and what else did ubunto install?

on th elinux box df will show you info for the whole partition,

"du --max-depth=1" will show you the info for each folder in what ever directory your in... if ubunto installed 20 GB's of worthless packages then that would be where the problem is... though if your 34 GB's ballooned up 20 GB's I'd say that something got coppied wrong... look and see where the GB's are going on the linux box.

Well, if I go into Nautilus and go to that folder, and select all folders/files and right-click and do Properties, it does confirm that there are 34GB of files there (the number of files matches too, I just don't recall that exact number off-hand).

But when I go into the Disk manager and go to that partition, it confirms that it's a 60GB partition, but that only 5GB is free.

Here's all the gruesome details:

When I ran df, it reported (for the partition in question):
Total: 61931264
Used: 57723400
Available: 1061944

When I use nautilus to navigate into the shared folder itself, and select all folders/files and right-click and do properties, it reports:
7709 items, 34.7 GB

When I go up a level, so I can select just the shared folder, and right-click and do Properties on that, I get:
7825 items, 34.7 GB

Any ideas?

The only idea I have left, is I'm going to try deleting everything from that folder (partition), since I still have a copy of the data on the NTFS version of the partition. Once the new partition is "empty", I'll check how much space is really used. Maybe I need to simply reformat it or something.

is there just nothing else on that partion then?

because you are right 34 GB's is not 60, but something else on that partion is taking up the rest of the space... do you have a seperate partition for your operating system? I've not come across a 20Gb linux install yet (but if any one were to do it, ubuntu would be first in line.... Twisted Evil

) but it sounds as though there is more on that partition then just your 34 GB's of files.

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2006 12:47 pm Post subject:

One more little tidbit. I did as I mentioned the end of the last post, and deleted all the files, in order to start over.

Sure enough, after all the files were gone, the disk manager still reported only 35GB free (out of 60GB total).

So I re-opened up the disk manager (this time as root), so I could format the disk.

Much to my surprise, now it reported 55GB free.

So I'm copying the files back to it now. Only time will tell whether I run out of space again... Very strange, to be sure.

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2006 12:52 pm Post subject:

anglachel wrote:

is there just nothing else on that partion then?

because you are right 34 GB's is not 60, but something else on that partion is taking up the rest of the space... do you have a seperate partition for your operating system? I've not come across a 20Gb linux install yet (but if any one were to do it, ubuntu would be first in line.... ) but it sounds as though there is more on that partition then just your 34 GB's of files.

Oops, yeah, sorry I wasn't more clear about that... I have my linux install partition completely separate from the partitions I set up exclusively for the purpose of being my file shares (in fact, there's even 8 separate ones of those, for that matter, set to specific sizes).

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2006 1:38 pm Post subject:

had a similar problem myself

turned out I had not formatted the disc.. once I did that, I had all my space back...