Can I use KdirStat over SSH?

Question

I have a headless server running Centos 5.9. I can only SSH into it, is it possible to use KdirStat or a similar tool to get a graphical view of disk usage?

HuHa · Answer 1 · 2017-02-23T16:31:49.937

5

Use the qdirstat-cache-writer or kdirstat-cache-writer Perl script on your server, copy the file to your desktop machine and view it there with QDirStat / KDirStat.

See also:

https://github.com/shundhammer/qdirstat
https://github.com/shundhammer/qdirstat/tree/master/scripts

Update 2017-02-23: Detailed instructions available at

https://github.com/shundhammer/qdirstat/blob/master/doc/QDirStat-for-Servers.md

-- HuHa (QDirStat / KDirStat author)

edited Feb 23 '17 at 16:31

answered Jan 20 '16 at 12:30

HuHa

151

This! :) Please also note that for cache import of "/"-directory to work properly you need to use the latest dev version (build yourself) - currently available ppa of last release for ubuntu contains a bug. Building works like a charm though. Perfect solution though! – icyerasor Aug 24 '16 at 12:16

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 31 '14 at 11:55

3

You can use sshfs to mount / on your desktop to /mnt/server/ on your pc. Then you start Kdirstat on this directory.

answered Jan 31 '14 at 11:55

davidbaumann

356

Why downnvoted? – davidbaumann Jan 31 '14 at 15:17
1

Seriously, two downvotes without a mention as to why? – peterph Jan 31 '14 at 15:18
1

In fact it's exactly what he needs to do without x fordwarding? Lol. – davidbaumann Jan 31 '14 at 15:19
1

That's why it's rather sad... – peterph Jan 31 '14 at 15:20
3

I am Gilles and I approve of this answer. – Gilles 'SO- stop being evil' Jan 31 '14 at 23:05
Yeah Elias came in here earlier today and DV'ed all of our A's and then posted his, assuming that they were all incorrect. All of the A's are appropriate, try not to let 1 bad seed bother you 8-) – slm Jan 31 '14 at 23:08
Downvoted because it is extremely slow. – Janus Troelsen Sep 08 '16 at 12:01

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Jan 31 '14 at 15:01

If you're running an X server on the system you're running ssh on you should need to do nothing more than this:

$ ssh -X remoteserver KdirStat

Here for example I'm ssh'ing into a CentOS 5.9 system running Babaob, another disk utilization app that comes with GNOME.

babaob

Incidentally there are a lot of applications for analyzing disk usage. I wrote them up here on my blog in a post titled: Command Line Tools for Analyzing Disk Usage on Fedora/CentOS/RHEL.

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Jan 31 '14 at 23:49

You can log into the server and use du, redirecting that output to a file (-a = include files, not just directories; -x = one filesystem only):

$ du -ax / > ~/root-du

then you can scp that file back, and browse it graphically with xdiskusage

$ scp server:root-du ~/root-du
$ xdiskusage ~/root-du

Of course, you can run du remotely over ssh, and pipe it to xdiskusage as well:

$ ssh server 'du -ax /' | xdiskusage

but I prefer to use files, so I can re-open it, compare before & after, etc.

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 31 '14 at 11:58

0

You probably don't have all the X environment (libraries, programs etc), but ssh can do X forwarding Trusted with -Y untrusted -X options.

try

xhost +
ssh -X user@remote_server
xclock
exit
xhost -

answered Jan 31 '14 at 11:58

X Tian

10,463

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Jan 31 '14 at 15:12

0

Having X installed/running on a server is considered to be a really bad practice, mostly because of security and stability issues.

Simply use KDE's KIOs which make it really easy to use a lot of different protocols in KDE applications.

Use a URL like sftp://user@host/some/directory to access the remote filesystem via SSH/SFTP:

KDE Filelight

answered Jan 31 '14 at 15:12

Elias Probst

1,053

3

X isn't installed in any o the solutions you just downvoted!! – slm Jan 31 '14 at 15:15

Can I use KdirStat over SSH?

6 Answers6

Linked