Department of PhysicsThere are several reasons why you may be over quota. This page helps describe some of the main reasons and provide several resolutions.
Find out what's hurting you
Linux desktops have a graphical tool to view your space. Select Applications, System Tools, Disk Usage Analyzer from your GNOME desktop. In this tool, click on Scan Home to display the disk usage in your home directory.
You can also run the following command in a terminal to find out which files and directories use up most of your space:
du --max-depth=1 -x -k | sort -nThe output will show the sizes in either K or M in the left column, and the offending file or folder in the right column.
If you are over quota by file count try this:
- find ~ -type d -exec sh -c "fc=\$(find '{}' -type f | wc -l); echo -e \"\$fc\t{}\"" \; | sort -n
Trash
When you drag files to your "Recycle Bin" they actually continue residing in your home directory until you "take out the trash." To do that, right-click on the "Trash" bin on your desktop and select "Empty Trash."
Large Files
It's not uncommon for people to store large files such as video clips or music in their home directory. This will quickly fill up the disk space, so such practice is not encouraged. You may utilize scratch-space on your system for such purposes, which is located in the "/xtmp" folder and tends to be quite roomy.
WARNING: /xtmp scratch space is not backed up and can be reformatted at any time without advance notice.
If you are a part of a research group, talk to your group supervisor about getting access to the group's project space where there are no quota limitations.
Request more disk quota
If you cannot free up any space, please contact ComputingSupport with a request to raise your disk quota. You can do that by replying to the quota warning message.