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[tunetyme]

Database management is not a very fun thing to deal with but it is necessary. I have over 15TB of media on my server plus 4 or 5 TB on removable discs that are media or media related files. As JRiver Media Center has evolved so has the files and their naming conventions. On such file is “video – movie or tv show.jpeg” that apparently is no longer used.  For my 5,000+ videos that is over 260,000,000 bytes or 260MB according to size explorer pro.  That does not include all those that I have already cleaned up.
When I delete files within MC and the folder is then empty it does ask if I want to delete the folder. However, if a jpeg such as a Folder is still within the folder that option to delete the folder is no longer offered. This is true for both video and audio. With over 100,000 songs, videos and tv shows I am going to estimate that I have multiple gigs of wasted space. In the audio, for example, I have a number of cases where I have 3 copies of jpegs in the same file folder, the oldest being whatever.jpeg then there is artist album .jpeg and Folder.jpeg. Things evolve but we need to clean up the mess too.  Each iteration copies the file instead of renaming or replacing the file.
There are so many more items that pollute our file structure like accurate rip files and the list is lengthy of files that at one time we may have thought it would be useful to have in the future and never used. I have been working on this off and on from the beginning of the year and already have invested hundreds of hours identifying dead files, folders, duplicates. While tools like size explorer are helpful it doesn’t work well at finding other issue such as multiple jpegs folder in a single folder.
Perhaps some smart lists could be developed to address this need.
Second item:
In the past if a file was missing the thumbnail would revert to the missing or no cover art. Now I can delete the entire contents of a video directory, close MC and restart and the thumbnail is there along with the full description of the movie. I really prefer the old method as it would visually trigger the need to investigate. For me it is like an early warning system that there may be a problem or I need to download the cover art.  Either case it was a great tool and benefit.
 

[blgentry]

Regarding finding unused or duplicate JPG or text files:  If it makes you happy to do this and you feel like it helps, don't let what I'm about to say stop you.

For me, the size of these files (JPEGs and text files) are a small percentage of the size of actual media files.  So having extras or unused really doesn't matter to me at all.  They are too small to worry about.  Disks are getting cheaper per TB all the time.  The value of hard drives to the consumer is just incredible today!  You get a huge amount of storage per dollar.  So again, tiny files aren't worth worrying with to me.

If you still want to clean it all up because it bothers you, or it makes you satisfied to save the extra space, please do it.  But I personally think it's not worth the time required.

Brian.

[Spike1000]

It looks like modern large spinning drives are about £0.02 per GB. . . The value of your time in dealing with this 'pollution' of your file system only you can calculate. . . .

Your second point is certainly annoying.  A windows port of the Linux 'du' command lists the size of folders, if you sort the output it'll put all the small directories to the top of the list (might give you a starting point):

Code: [Select]

c:\usr\bin\du.exe e:\media | c:\usr\bin\sort.exe -n

Spike

[Moe]

it doesn’t work well at finding other issue such as multiple jpegs folder in a single folder.

In an images pane view in MC add a new category with these settings
 


Make sure you don't miss the sorting option

This will generate a pane that will show you the number of images per folder.  Scroll to the bottom and you'll see the ones with more than one.  I've never used this function before just now, so it may be able to be optimized a bit.  But this will quickly show you which folders have more than one image in them.

[tunetyme]

Moe, thank-you. I haven't used this function before and frankly I didn't know it existed. I never use image view as I have too many files with over 100k music and over 5k video files and a ton more offline.

 Spike and BLGentry. You are absolutely right about how cheap it is per GB. Let's look at real cost outlay and timing. Currently, I have my file server, onsite backups and offsite backups. Onsite mirrored backup monthly and offsite when I fill a disc with data about quarterly. My next step up is to 8 TB drives 7 for the server (1 parity) and 6 data. plus the mirrored drives and at least one hot spare. That is 14 drives and they will last about 3 years. The onsite drives become the offsite drives where I consolidate over time and discard the smallest drives. Currently 8 TB drives are on sale for $237 US delivered times 14 is $3,318 US. As a general rule, tech drops about 20% per year or $663 USD that I can save if I can squeeze another year out of my 2 year old 4 TB drives. $663 buys a lot of media if I take out the trash. The approximate 10% trash I have on my drives is after I have tried to clean up on a regular basis over the years. I can't imagine how much wasted space you must have on your drives. I am sure you take out the trash from your house on a regular basis. I don't think it is to much to ask for tools to clean up the database. If you spend a little time just to see how much garbage you have accumulated you will be amazed at how much space you recover. The JPEG files are not the only garbage files but they are common to both audio and video.