Tools to visualize file size distributions

Question

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How to understand what's taking up space?

Are there any tools in Linux for graphically visualizing the distribution of file sizes under a given path?

I am looking for something along the lines of WinDirStat, but on Linux, e.g. see snapshot below:

enter image description here

Also, are there any similar tools that would show such distribution on a terminal? (I usually use df -csh *, but this only shows one level of a file hierarchy, and does not have any mechanisms for navigating a report, e.g. as I browse up and down through a file hierarchy).

score 17 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 27 '20 at 10:41

17

I am using Disk Usage Analyser (aka Baobab), its output looks like this. (It's a png, couldn't paste it here). I believe it's part of the regular Ubuntu installation.

Also, there's KDirStat, of which WinDirStat is a clone. Here's a screenshot:

enter image description here

Check out this page 6 Great Apps to View Disk Usage in Linux for a collection of other tools.

edited Nov 27 '20 at 10:41

mignon426

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answered Jul 20 '12 at 19:12

Levon

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this was rebuilt and is now called QDirStat. It is IMMENSELY fast, seems like some dark magic to me. I definitely recommend it – phil294 Aug 06 '16 at 12:54
@Blauhirn Thanks, I'll definitely will check it out. – Levon Aug 06 '16 at 16:43

score 16 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 21 '12 at 03:52

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Another ncurses alternative is ncdu.

answered Jul 21 '12 at 03:52

AnonymousLurker

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That works really well. And even on a character ssh terminal. – SDsolar Sep 09 '17 at 07:41
...and is very fast – ntg Jun 15 '21 at 19:59
Great tool! Thank you! – Sklavit Jul 16 '21 at 12:51

matlehmann · Answer 3 · 2012-07-20T20:30:51.317

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I am using ncdu for that purpose on the command line. The Homepage of that tool includes a list of similar software: http://dev.yorhel.nl/ncdu

On KDE there is Filelight, which does a similar job, but with a slightly different representation.

enter image description here

edited Jul 20 '12 at 20:30

answered Jul 20 '12 at 20:24

matlehmann

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ncdu is great! – Matthias Braun Dec 11 '16 at 23:01
Ditto! Love ncdu - Thanks from September 2017 (Ubuntu 16.04 LTS). – SDsolar Sep 09 '17 at 07:40

score 5 · Answer 4 · edited Nov 07 '15 at 22:30

An oldy but goody: xdu It's an X11 display program, but you actually run it from the command line: du | xdu I believe that du also takes an argument, the directory in which to start. Apparently you can also use xdu to display other hierarchically-arranged numerical data, too.

xdu is available as a package on Debian. And appart from the link to the web archive given above, you can also get an updated version of the code from Debian to compile it on your system.

It isn't hard. You'll need xmkmf or something from the "imake" package of products.

You could also try xdiskuage said to be inspired by xdu which is more recent and more actively maintained.

Your link is broken. – Gavin S. Yancey Nov 07 '15 at 21:46 — Gavin S. Yancey, Nov 07 '15 at 21:46

score 4 · Answer 5 · answered Jul 20 '12 at 19:13

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The GTK Tool Baobab looks just like the tool you are showing above.

The NCURSES tool TDU will provide you with a nice text-mode console tool.

Baobab Screen Shot TDU Screen Shot

answered Jul 20 '12 at 19:13

Tim

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Tools to visualize file size distributions

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