Checking the Size of Files

You can check the size of files and sort them by using the ls command. You can find files that exceed a size limit by using the find command. For more information, see the ls(1) and find(1) man pages.

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Note - If you run out of space in the /var directory, do not symbolically link the /var directory to a directory on a file system with more disk space. Doing so, even as a temporary measure, might cause problems for certain Solaris daemon processes and utilities.

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How to Display the Size of Files

1. Change to the directory where the files you want to check are located.
2. Display the size of the files.

   $ ls [-lh] [-s]

   -l

   Displays a list of files and directories in long format, showing the sizes in bytes. (See the example that follows.)

   -h

   Scales file sizes and directory sizes into Kbytes, Mbytes, Gbytes, or Tbytes when the file or directory size is larger than 1024 bytes. This option also modifies the output displayed by the -o, -n, -@, and -g options to display file or directory sizes in the new format. For more information, see thels(1) man page.

   -s

   Displays a list of the files and directories, showing the sizes in blocks.

Example 6-4 Displaying the Size of Files

The following example shows that the lastlog and messages files are larger than the other files in the /var/adm directory.

$ cd /var/adm
$ ls -lh
total 148
drwxrwxr-x   5 adm      adm          512 Nov 26 09:39 acct/
-rw-------   1 uucp     bin            0 Nov 26 09:25 aculog
drwxr-xr-x   2 adm      adm          512 Nov 26 09:25 exacct/
-r--r--r--   1 root     other       342K Nov 26 13:56 lastlog
drwxr-xr-x   2 adm      adm          512 Nov 26 09:25 log/
-rw-r--r--   1 root     root         20K Nov 26 13:55 messages
drwxr-xr-x   2 adm      adm          512 Nov 26 09:25 passwd/
drwxrwxr-x   2 adm      sys          512 Nov 26 09:39 sa/
drwxr-xr-x   2 root     sys          512 Nov 26 09:49 sm.bin/
-rw-rw-rw-   1 root     bin            0 Nov 26 09:25 spellhist
drwxr-xr-x   2 root     sys          512 Nov 26 09:25 streams/
-rw-r--r--   1 root     bin         3.3K Nov 26 13:56 utmpx
-rw-r--r--   1 root     root           0 Nov 26 10:17 vold.log
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm          19K Nov 26 13:56 wtmpx

The following example shows that the lpsched.1 file uses two blocks.

$ cd /var/lp/logs
$ ls -s
total 2            0 lpsched       2 lpsched.1

How to Find Large Files

1. Change to the directory that you want to search.
2. Display the size of files in blocks from largest to smallest.

   • If the characters or columns for the files are different, use the following command to sort a list of files by block size, from largest to smallest.

     $ ls -l | sort +4rn | more

     Note that this command sorts files in a list by the character that is in the fourth field, starting from the left.

   • If the characters or columns for the files are the same, use the following command to sort a list of files by block size, from largest to smallest.

     $ ls -s | sort -nr | more

     Note that this command sorts files in a list, starting with the left most character.

Example 6-5 Finding Large Files (Sorting by the Fifth Field's Character)

$ cd /var/adm
$ ls -l | sort +4rn | more
-r--r--r--   1 root     root     4568368 Oct 17 08:36 lastlog
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       697040 Oct 17 12:30 pacct.9
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       280520 Oct 17 13:05 pacct.2
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       277360 Oct 17 12:55 pacct.4
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       264080 Oct 17 12:45 pacct.6
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       255840 Oct 17 12:40 pacct.7
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       254120 Oct 17 13:10 pacct.1
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       250360 Oct 17 12:25 pacct.10
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       248880 Oct 17 13:00 pacct.3
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       247200 Oct 17 12:35 pacct.8
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       246720 Oct 17 13:15 pacct.0
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       245920 Oct 17 12:50 pacct.5
-rw-r--r--   1 root     root      190229 Oct  5 03:02 messages.1
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       156800 Oct 17 13:17 pacct
-rw-r--r--   1 adm      adm       129084 Oct 17 08:36 wtmpx

Example 6-6 Finding Large Files (Sorting by the Left Most Character)

In the following example, the lastlog and messages files are the largest files in the /var/adm directory.

$ cd /var/adm
$ ls -s | sort -nr | more
  48 lastlog
  30 messages
  24 wtmpx
  18 pacct
   8 utmpx
   2 vold.log
   2 sulog
   2 sm.bin/
   2 sa/
   2 passwd/
   2 pacct1
   2 log/
   2 acct/
   0 spellhist
   0 aculog
total 144

How to Find Files That Exceed a Specified Size Limit

• To locate and display the names of files that exceed a specified size, use the find command.

  $ find directory -size +nnn 

  directory

  Identifies the directory that you want to search.

  -size +nnn

  Is a number of 512-byte blocks. Files that exceed this size are listed.

Example 6-7 Finding Files That Exceed a Specified Size Limit

The following example shows how to find files larger than 400 blocks in the current working directory. The -print option displays the output of the find command.

$ find . -size +400 -print
./Howto/howto.doc
./Howto/howto.doc.backup
./Howto/howtotest.doc
./Routine/routineBackupconcepts.doc
./Routine/routineIntro.doc
./Routine/routineTroublefsck.doc
./.record
./Mail/pagination
./Config/configPrintadmin.doc
./Config/configPrintsetup.doc
./Config/configMailappx.doc
./Config/configMailconcepts.doc
./snapshot.rs