Re: When is it not okay to delete cache files?

On Apr 23, 2005, at 10:51 AM, Josef Lowder wrote:
> I use cdrecord from the command line to burn a cd backup
> of all of my home directory files, and when I do that, the
> process displays a long list of files with the message:
>

>     "Using CACHEnnnn.ZZZ for /home/joe/....... "

>
> A long list of numbers appears instead of "nnnn.ZZZ" and
> corresponding "cache" filenames appear instead of "......."
> in the above example.
>
> Most of these filenames appear in "dot" (.) subdirectories and
> many have dates a year or two old.
>
> Is there any reason why any of these files cannot be deleted
> off my system?

In general, no. Cache files exist solely so an application doesn't
have to go through a more expensive operation (network, cpu, disk, etc)
multiple times for the same result. It's likely that the cache files
you're seeing are a result of web browsing. Deleting them will just
cause your browser to refetch the page or image or whatever the next
time it tries.

Still, some things to consider:
1. It's generally a bad idea to delete cache files of any sort while
the app that uses them is running. That means that the best time to
delete cache files is when you either aren't logged in (a cron job, for
instance), or when you know that the app that uses the cache files
isn't running.

2. It's generally a better idea to modify your backup procedure to skip
the cache files than to delete them. Whatever script you are using can
probably be modified to just skip the files during the backup
procedure. That way, you get the best of both worlds. Whatever app is
using the files gets the speedup but your backups aren't polluted with
"useless" files.

Kurt

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