UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi Experts,

If you use df -iv and finds out that one of your mounted drives has 100% inodes used, how can you free it to have more free inodes%? I have removed some files, but still have the 100% used.

Thanks in advance.

You might need to remove enough files, perhaps .5% or 1% of them, for the value to display 99%.

I've not seen an out of inodes situation in many years. the number of available inodes is determined at filesystem creation, and that number is dependent on the blocksize used. as previously suggested by jlliagre, removing files/directories is the only way to reduce the usage, and it's the count of files/directories removed, not the byte size, that matters. I don't know of any way to allocate more without building a new filesystem with a smaller blocksize.

Perhaps if you build a new filesystem, then move everything across, it will re-org/free some inodes. Having lots & lots & lots of small files being created & deleted all the time can tie up inodes (I think) Unfortunately, downtime may be required to arrange a fix.



I hope that this helps,

Robin
Liverpool/Blackburn