How to delete the unwanted files in ubuntu

[Cavsfan]

Ubuntu Tweak safely removes unneeded packages and some other stuff a lot more safely than computer janitor.
You can get that with SPM.

However as others have stated, you do not have to worry about cleaning stuff up or defragmenting unless
you are running out of room on your drive.

[bodhi.zazen]

In general all OS collect "junk" and all file systems fragment.

In general this is almost an non-issue in Linux.

Just as with Windows, you need to understand your system before you go deleting things, otherwise you may well delete things you should not.

See :

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/cleaning-u...in-ubuntu.html

http://www.howtoforge.com/delete-unn...on-ubuntu-9.04

Again, just as with windows, if you blindly run tools such as bleachbit and delete "everything" expect problems.

If you take the time to examine your system you should be fine. If in doubt, make a back up, delete the file(s) and if you have problems restore from back up or try it in a VM.

In terms of fragmentation, people often, IMO, discuss fragmentation without understanding the core issue. Linux file systems fragment, but typically fragmentation is low (compared to Windows) and as such does not affect performance. There can be exceptions, especially if the hard drive is almost full.

IMO this is a nice start :

http://www.felipecruz.com/blog_linux...gmentation.php

So yes Linux file systems fragment, but not with typical use not enough to affect performance (fragmentation of often < 5% on Linux, but on Windows, especially with FAT it can be over 100 %).

If fragmentation occurs it is most often due to either a full HD or large files.

[kukibird1]

If you are really keen try Bleachbit - it's in the repos.

It does a good job of cleaning up unwanted caches and such.

Warning be VERY careful if you use it as root - you could seriously bork your system

+1

http://bleachbit.sourceforge.net/

[bodhi.zazen]

I screen my root partition for fragmentation (I only have root and swap on this particualr box)

My fragmentation is 0.127 %

As a comparison, my NTFS partition on Windows is 29 % fragmented (File fragmentation = 59 %).

Since you need at least 10 % fragmentation to affect performance there is no need to defragment the linux partition.

Linux is not Windows.

So the question is not do linux file systems fragment or not, the question is do they fragment enough to affect performance ? They can under unusual circumstances, but it is rare.

[J V]

Before you reply to this

Once more

Bhodi is right, fragmentation isn't a problem on linux... Seriously 0.127%? Oo

How did you find that out? Last time I remember I had to... actually the only way I remember to find fragmentation didn't work...

[bodhi.zazen]

Once more

Bhodi is right, fragmentation isn't a problem on linux... Seriously 0.127%? Oo

How did you find that out? Last time I remember I had to... actually the only way I remember to find fragmentation didn't work...

You can boot a live CD and use fsck

sudo fsck -vn /dev/sda1

Or there is a script on the Gentoo forums

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-3081971.html

[n1ght5t4lk3r]

A quick query about Bleachbit, I normally ran this once every so often when i used Jaunty (and never as root) , mostly just cache, browsing history, thumbnails and trash and so on but after installing Lucid earlier I ran the preview and there was like 400+mb of files, mostly un-needed language files and a fair amount of .deb files, I assume the .debs were from the installation of lucid since I haven't manually installed anything from .deb yet. Is it safe to delete these language files and .debs? (at the very least all the language files)?
I know in this day and age 400mb is a relatively negligible amount but with a nice fresh install of the OS I would like it as clean as possible right from the outset, but of course don't wish to bork my system since these files require running bleachbit as root in order to delete.

[bodhi.zazen]

A quick query about Bleachbit, I normally ran this once every so often when i used Jaunty (and never as root) , mostly just cache, browsing history, thumbnails and trash and so on but after installing Lucid earlier I ran the preview and there was like 400+mb of files, mostly un-needed language files and a fair amount of .deb files, I assume the .debs were from the installation of lucid since I haven't manually installed anything from .deb yet. Is it safe to delete these language files and .debs? (at the very least all the language files)?
I know in this day and age 400mb is a relatively negligible amount but with a nice fresh install of the OS I would like it as clean as possible right from the outset, but of course don't wish to bork my system since these files require running bleachbit as root in order to delete.

If you would like to run a lean system, consider learning to perform a minimal install and from that base only install the applications you want.

Often people will use a lighter weight desktop environment such as Openbox , but you can install a minimal gnome or kde or xfce if you wish.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/In...tion/MinimalCD

[n1ght5t4lk3r]

Well, i never asked about 'lean', and I'm perfectly happy with Ubuntu the way it comes as the standard version, I would just like to remove all the language files (several thousand of them) that I personally do not need, everything else is fine in terms of amount of content (in fact, have had to add a lot more).
Now, I asked a simple, genuine question...Is it safe to remove these?...and your "consider learning to...." response seems a little snide, I've seen similar mooded replies to others from you around the forums and its quite condescending when most of these people are new or fairly new users versus your X amount of years experience, not everyone is as pro as you and these queries are valid. (This is just a casual observation btw, not me being hostile....which is also usually your comeback when challenged over your reply)
OK a minimal install cd might be more streamlined for some but its still good for my own personal knowledge to know if doing something is safe or not, don't you think? Its all part of the learning a new system after many years of windows.

[mkvnmtr]

If you use synaptic to remove files that you think may be unneeded it will tell you if it plans to remove anything else. This gives you time to think about it and back out.