[SOLVED] No space left on device

[JerryP]

I can't figure out what happened or how to correct it.
I tried to print a document and it wouldn't print. Something gave me the idea rebooting would fix it. I restarted the system and got to the login screen, put in my password and ran into "Temp directory (/tmp) is out of disk space. KDE is unable to start".  I booted up with a live CD and deleted the contents of /tmp as well as home/tmp for good measure. Neither had much in them.
Next boot, as it's coming up I hit esc to watch what was happening and it hung at "/var/run/nscd/nscd.pid:no space left on device".
There is plenty of space.  
I booted with the live CD again and found that live OS had a nscd.pid file and mine didn't so I copied it.  Rebooted and watched an now it's saying something else has "no space left on device".  
I'd like to fix it but my home is on it's own partition so if I had to I could reinstall but I'm happy with what I have and would have to do all the annoying tweaking again.
All peripherals are unplugged and the printer is off.
Any suggestions will be appreciated and tried to fix it.
Thanks

[bicol_willem]

Are you sure that your / partition isn´t full?  There might be tons of space on the disk in i.e. /home but still your / (root) partition can be full (too small).

[Old-Polack]

JerryP:

Boot the liveCD then, as root, create a couple of mount point directories on which to mount the two installed system partitions. I would suggest /mnt/home and /mnt/root as the mount point directories. The commands would be;

[root@localhost ~]# mkdir -p /mnt/home /mnt/root                                 <Enter>

[root@localhost ~]# mount /dev/sdxn /mnt/root                                 <Enter>

[root@localhost ~]# mount /dev/sdxn /mnt/home                                 <Enter>

Replace the x with the proper drive letter and n with the proper partition number for both commands.

Follow that with the df command.

[root@localhost ~]# df                                        <Enter>

Post your results, and stay booted to the liveCD. Don't reboot, or you will have to repeat all of the above.

[Phil]

Hi Jerry,

Only after you have exactly followed O-Ps instructions and you are sorted try this:

Fire up a terminal
su to root
# cd to suspect directory

du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10

The above will identify the largest 10 files in a directory

[tschommer]

JerryP,

is it possible that your /etc/fstab contains an entry

Code: [Select]

none /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0
?

Then your temp folder would be mapped to ram, and depending on the amount of your memory you'd quickly run out of space.

If so, please comment this line (insert a '#' at the beginning of the line).

[JerryP]

[root@localhost root]# df
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root             1.6G  210M  1.4G  13% /
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /media/disk
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /mnt/root
/dev/sda1             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
/dev/sda6             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
[root@localhost root]#

OK. So obviously the computer is right but how could that have happened?   Could it be that I not too long ago I ran Bleachbit?  I rebooted after that and all seemed OK but maybe at that point whatever little bit went into /tmp and filled the drive so this next reboot didn't have room to do it?  How do I find out what has filled sda1?

[menotu]

[root@localhost root]# df
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root             1.6G  210M  1.4G  13% /
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /media/disk
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /mnt/root
/dev/sda1             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
/dev/sda6             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
[root@localhost root]#

OK. So obviously the computer is right but how could that have happened?   Could it be that I not too long ago I ran Bleachbit?  I rebooted after that and all seemed OK but maybe at that point whatever little bit went into /tmp and filled the drive so this next reboot didn't have room to do it?  How do I find out what has filled sda1?

Just a thought, did you also run Bleachbit as root?

[Old-Polack]

[root@localhost root]# df
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root             1.6G  210M  1.4G  13% /
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /media/disk
/dev/sda1              50G   50G     0 100% /mnt/root
/dev/sda1             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
/dev/sda6             860G  637G  224G  75% /mnt/home
[root@localhost root]#

OK. So obviously the computer is right but how could that have happened?   Could it be that I not too long ago I ran Bleachbit?  I rebooted after that and all seemed OK but maybe at that point whatever little bit went into /tmp and filled the drive so this next reboot didn't have room to do it?  How do I find out what has filled sda1?

Now do what Phil instructed;

[root@localhost root]# cd /mnt/root                                      <Enter>

[root@localhost root]# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10                                           <Enter>

Wait for the results, it could take a while.

Post your results.

[JerryP]

[root@localhost root]# cd /mnt/root
[root@localhost root]# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10
28G     media
11G     root
9.1G    usr
1.2G    opt
357M    var
166M    lib
138M    etc
77M     boot
76M     PCLOS_Home.profile
21M     sbin
[root@localhost root]# du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10
11G     root
9.1G    usr
1.2G    opt
357M    var
166M    lib
138M    etc
77M     boot
76M     PCLOS_Home.profile
21M     sbin
15M     bin
[root@localhost root]#

It looks like a backup I was trying to do ended up on the hard drive instead of the actual backup media. I deleted it.
I figured I'd post this before rebooting so it wouldn't be lost but I'm pretty confident "things" will be better now.  I'll let you know from my regular system if all if OK. 
Thanks

[JerryP]

Hurray!  All is well in the world, peace on earth (please god) and Merry Xmas.

I think it was "Simple Backup" as I have been trying to do a backup and failing with "everything".  I'm going to give that a shot again but if unsuccessful it will be the subject of a different post.

Thank you all and to all a good night (so to speak).
 

[Old-Polack]

Hurray!  All is well in the world, peace on earth (please god) and Merry Xmas.

I think it was "Simple Backup" as I have been trying to do a backup and failing with "everything".  I'm going to give that a shot again but if unsuccessful it will be the subject of a different post.

Thank you all and to all a good night (so to speak).
 

What is the 11G in /root? There should be almost nothing there. Mine is 3.4M.

[Phil]

Hi Jerry,

Good to hear. I have borked my system several times and have mysteriously had / at 100%, its disconcerting.

I back up my root partition with clonezilla, which makes a compressed image. I do this say once a month and before any big synaptic change, and store maybe three images. See Tricks & Tips.

I back up my /home folder and personal files using rsync and a cron job twice a week, to another disk.

Lots of ways to back up the system and files. Whatever you prefer stick to it, and then PCLOS becomes tediously boring.

[russell.eberhardt]

I had exactly the same problem with LuckyBackup when I first used it I filled up the root partition.  However, once I figured out how to use it and set it up to do an automatic incremental backup on the first boot of every day I've had no problem.

Russell;

[JerryP]

What is the 11G in /root? There should be almost nothing there. Mine is 3.4M.

Wow. I have all sorts stuff in there. 
Maybe I should rename it and then make an empty one and reboot to see what happens?

file:///root/.Desktop
file:///root/.VirtualBox
file:///root/.Xauthority
file:///root/.Xdefaults
file:///root/.adobe
file:///root/.appdata
file:///root/.bash_completion
file:///root/.bash_history
file:///root/.bash_logout
file:///root/.bash_profile
file:///root/.bashrc
file:///root/.cache
file:///root/.config
file:///root/.cream
file:///root/.cshrc
file:///root/.dbus
file:///root/.directory
file:///root/.dmrc
file:///root/.emelfm
file:///root/.esd_auth
file:///root/.fonts.conf
file:///root/.fstab.log
file:///root/.gconf
file:///root/.gconfd
file:///root/.gkrellm2
file:///root/.gnome2
file:///root/.gnome2_private
file:///root/.gnupg
file:///root/.google
file:///root/.gstreamer-0.10
file:///root/.gtk-bookmarks
file:///root/.gtkrc-2.0
file:///root/.gvfs
file:///root/.inspect_tmp_dir
file:///root/.kde4
file:///root/.local
file:///root/.luckyBackup
file:///root/.macromedia
file:///root/.marble
file:///root/.mdk-menu-migrated
file:///root/.menu-updates.stamp
file:///root/.mozilla
file:///root/.mplayer
file:///root/.mtinkrc
file:///root/.nautilus
file:///root/.ntfs-config.conf
file:///root/.pulse
file:///root/.pulse-cookie
file:///root/.rnd
file:///root/.synaptic
file:///root/.tcshrc
file:///root/.thumbnails
file:///root/.thunderbird
file:///root/.thunderbird-bak
file:///root/.viminfo
file:///root/.xauth
file:///root/.xauth06Mg6x
file:///root/.xauth1tVjOA
file:///root/.xauth1xaxov
file:///root/.xauth4PsnwT
file:///root/.xauth4TvcNq
file:///root/.xauth9Y4iCz
file:///root/.xauthA1e6ih
file:///root/.xauthFOGM7k
file:///root/.xauthMIEhJ3
file:///root/.xauthcpBpx2
file:///root/.xauthns4soW
file:///root/.xauthtyyKUa
file:///root/.xauthu0UCec
file:///root/.xauthzKY9X1
file:///root/.xine
file:///root/.xsession-errors
file:///root/Desktop
file:///root/Documents
file:///root/Downloads
file:///root/LibreOffice_Info.txt
file:///root/Music
file:///root/Pictures
file:///root/Templates
file:///root/Videos
file:///root/drakx
file:///root/ekecupld.xml
file:///root/logs
file:///root/recup_dir.1
file:///root/tmp

[Phil]

I am not sure if roots home directory will automatically be recreated, perhaps not a good idea.

Do the search again for the biggest files:

>su
#cd /root
#du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -10
#du -hsx * | sort -rh | head -20  (If you want the 20 biggest files....)

Most files should be miniscule configuration files, so as O-P is suggesting something is amiss.