[Samba] cleaning up duplicate files on the file server

[James A. Dinkel]

I imagine we can save some space on our file server by cleaning up all
the files that are saved multiple times by different people.  There is
already the fdupes command in linux that will scan a directory tree and
report what files have duplicates.  This could be easily scripted to
turn those duplicate files into symlinks to one file.

 

The problem is see, then, is what would happen if someone tries to
change a duplicate file that they think is their own copy.  Of course,
everyone with a symlink to that file would get the changes, which is not
what I would want.  What it would need is some sort of copy-on-edit
mechanism, so when the file is changed, instead of changing the original
file, the symlink is replaced with the edited version of the file.

 

Does this make sense?  Has anyone else thought about this, or found an
elegant solution to this?

 

James Dinkel

Network Engineer

Butler County of Kansas

 

There are 10 types of people in the world:  those who understand binary,
and those who don't.