[FRIAM] Advice on configuring computers

[Owen Densmore]

I'd recommend using a program that tells you where all the storage goes to.

My OS has a simple facility that tells me I have 75GB left out of 250GB SSD
drive on my laptop. That's OK but prompts me to run a finer grain program
that tells me what my folder hierarchies contain. It good in that it tells
me the total storage of each top-most folder, then dives into each of them,
recursively telling how much each of the second, third, etc level folder
contains.

Doing this is constantly surprising! For example, I found that my photos
and music were well over 10GB. And that my programming libraries
(./node-modules) were absolutely out of control. And many apps and system
tools have huge "caches" of files.

My solution is to use DropBox, a cloud storage and sync (sync == keep the
files synchronized over my various computers, tablets and phone). Syncing
can actually cause a huge *increase* in storage, but DB has a simple
setting that tells it to just use the cloud version, thus turning into a
fairly easily managed system.

DB also lets me share files with others easily, so for example I can share
a model/simulation I'm working on with others. Github also solves this sort
of storage but I think isn't germane here. Google Docs might, however.

So I developed a simple approach to DB: any keystroke I make ends up there:
i.e. all docs I create is on DB. Photos, no .. I take the pictures but
don't edit them .. i.e. add/subtract bits, thus they do not fall under the
DB range, just backup.

DB isn't cheap .. it starts out free for up to 6 GB but its first paid
level is $100/year for 1TB. And it hasn't got all the features I need. But
so far is the best for me.

I find that my cog load for my own docs is around 20GB so am happy with
cloud storage for all the rest. And actually, a lot of my cloud storage is
a form of backup.

Do you have a similar situation? I realize storage is "domain specific".

   -- Owen
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