ISOFS Files Too Big?

justin_brody · Apprentice Joined: 26 Jan 2005 Posts: 283

Hi,
I have a (relatively) small directory that I want to burn to DVD:

justin_brody · Apprentice Joined: 26 Jan 2005 Posts: 283

For what it's worth, I get an 11 gig file when I tar the directory too. This seems really counter-intuitive to me. I would think that tarring would create a smaller file since it would get rid of any space wasted by partially used blocks...

madams · Posted: Mon Jul 31, 2006 6:23 pm Post subject:

do you have any 'symlinks' pointing somewhere else??

Either:
A) try using du -hsL /path/to/files (this will include filesizes of the file the symlink points to)

or

B) ensure that 'tar' does not to follow the symlinks, just include the symlink pointer itself i.e. don't use the 'tar -h or --dereference flags.

justin_brody · Apprentice Joined: 26 Jan 2005 Posts: 283

Doh! That seems to be it.
My .wine directory has a big symlink
pointing right back to the root!

Thanks for the suggestion!

madams · Posted: Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:04 pm Post subject:

I had a symlink to /proc in my home directory that got me.. all of a sudden my backups where twice as big. Chased it that one for a couple of hours..