lostfiles script from the AUR

GunnDawg · 2015-06-10 10:23:58

I recently heard about the lostfiles app and decided to grab it from the AUR to see what my orphaned files situation was like as keeping a clean and tidy file system is something i strive for. Upon running it I found that it lists quite a few things that I cant imagine my system can do without, or at least not very well. It listed things like:

/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/xorg.conf
/etc/sddm.conf

and various other items that seem quite crucial to my system. I was under the impression "lostfiles" would list things that are safe to remove from the system. Again I'm trying to tidy it up and make sure things that dont need to be on here, aren't. I understand sometimes things will throw false positives, but I'd say 50% or more of the list it spit at me were files crucial to system operation.

Anyways, just looking to get some input on this script. Am I using it wrong? Not reading into it correctly?

arojas · 2015-06-10 10:30:43

lostfiles lists files which are not owned by any package, nothing more, nothing less. It doesn't tell you anything about the importance of those files. Some will be crucial, some will not, that is for you to decide.

GunnDawg · 2015-06-10 10:32:31

arojas wrote:

lostfiles lists files which are not owned by any package, nothing more, nothing less. It doesn't tell you anything about the importance of those files. Some will be crucial, some will not, that is for you to decide.

Ah very well. Thank you. I guess it cant quite be used as a means for file system clean up then. Still trying to find the most optimal ways to keep a clean file system.

progandy · 2015-06-10 11:08:16

GunnDawg wrote:

arojas wrote:
lostfiles lists files which are not owned by any package, nothing more, nothing less. It doesn't tell you anything about the importance of those files. Some will be crucial, some will not, that is for you to decide.
Ah very well. Thank you. I guess it cant quite be used as a means for file system clean up then. Still trying to find the most optimal ways to keep a clean file system.

You can use the result of lostfiles in your own script. Go through it manually and assign it to a package in your own database. Then the next time you run your script it can filter the output of lostfiles against your list.

Trilby · 2015-06-10 11:13:57

Or better yet, just edit the script. It is a trivially simple script - I'm surprised it's even in the AUR. A vast majority of the script is just the exclusion list. You can add to that exclusion list to make it better fit your system.

Arch Linux

#1 2015-06-10 10:23:58

lostfiles script from the AUR

#2 2015-06-10 10:30:43

Re: lostfiles script from the AUR

#3 2015-06-10 10:32:31

Re: lostfiles script from the AUR

#4 2015-06-10 11:08:16

Re: lostfiles script from the AUR

#5 2015-06-10 11:13:57

Re: lostfiles script from the AUR

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