nudsDeDuper Files

NudsDeDuper(BETA) README
Author Shaun Dunmall sdunmall@gmail.com


***************************  WARNING **************************

PLEASE BEAR IN MIND THIS IS A BETA TOOL - IT MAY WRECK YOUR SYSTEM !!!
ONLY USE IN A TEST ENVIRONMENT.
IF YOU USE THE -R OPTION IT WILL MAKE PERMANENT IRREVERSIBLE CHANGES TO YOUR SYSTEM.

***************************  WARNING **************************

INSTALLATION
1) Drop the folder where ever you like, in this document we'll call the path to the JAR file "install-path".



RUNNING
1) Start a DOS box.
2) Type JAVA -JAR install-path\NudsDeDuper.jar initialPath [-e EXT] [-r]

Where :
       initialPath is the entry point in the file system to start search for duplicate files. (Mandatory)

       EXT is the extention of the file type you wish to de-duplicate, e.g. JPG. (Optional)
          If no extention is specified then ALL files are deduping candidates.

       -r Indicates that you wish to actually perform the reclaim, i.e. deduplicate, (Optional)
          rather than just calculate what savings could be made if you did, which is all it does if you don't include it.



SOURCE
The SOURCE is a Zip file of a NetBEans (6.9) project folder.



WHAT DOES THE PROGRAM DO?
It deduplicates files to reclaim file system space.



HOW DOES IT WORK?
It calculates an MD5 checksum for all the files that have the extention specified from the initial path down through all it's subdirectories.  Then replaces duplicate files with Windows Hard-Links.

After deduplication the files won't look any different, but check the free space on the C: drive (or whatever) before and after deduping to see the space saving you have made.




RECOMMENDED USE
Avoid deduping any system folders, this may prove fatal to your system.



WHY DOES IT EXIST?
Firstly, as a programming excercise for me.
Secondly, to perform as useful function, hopefully.
Thirdly, this is a long shot admittedly, to help any other newbie (Java) programmers out there by providing sample code that may prove useful in some project of their own. (Even if only showing how NOT to do something!!  :-)



ANY USE TO YOU?
If you do find it useful I'd love to know about it.
Or if you can think of ways to improve it, of which I'm sure there are many, please do email me.



***************************  WARNING **************************

PLEASE BEAR IN MIND THIS IS A BETA TOOL - IT MAY WRECK YOUR SYSTEM !!!
ONLY USE IN A TEST ENVIRONMENT.
IF YOU USE THE -R OPTION IT WILL MAKE PERMANENT IRREVERSIBLE CHANGES TO YOUR SYSTEM.

***************************  WARNING **************************


Thanks very much for taking the time to check this out, I hope you find it useful.



CHANGELOG
v0.1.0beta - First Beta released