running out of disk space

[k_norr]

I let someone use my vision system yesterday and they left it on (recording) for a long time. The hard disk ran out of space (1M left) and froze. I freed up some space, but I believe there is something on that drive that is not showing up on a search. Is it possible that a file that was being saved when the drive ran out of space did not close? Would this cause it to not show up on a search of the drive and, if so, is there a remedy? Thanks!

Ken

[MRedRaider]

The most obvious solution is probably your best solution:

1. Reboot. (Clears Heap from Windows point of view and resets resources in Windows including virtual memory)

2. Run disk cleanup. (Open Windows Explorer>> right click on drive>> properties >> there is a button below the pie chart called Disk Cleanup.

The utility takes a minute to do some analysis then allows you to automagically clean up some temp files from the drive.

If you have already tried this, I appologize for being Mr. Obvious.

[smercurio_fc]

Just a dumb question: Shouldn't you know where the file is given that your program is generating it?

Even if the file is not closed it would still be on the hard disk unless you don't write it out until the program completes, and it doesn't sound like your program does that.

More than likely the way your search parameters are not set up properly or the file isn't called what you think it is. You can modify the search so that instead of searching by name, perform a search to find all files that were modified within the last day. Keep in mind that if you're doing this on a Windows box, Windows, as usual, tries to be "smart" about searches and, as usual, fails to be smart and tends to screw things up, especially if you have the Indexing Service running.

Rebooting, as Matt suggested, is not a bad suggestion. That seems to fix so many problems in Windows it's a wonder why we don't all choose to just leave the computers off.

[k_norr]

We're okay for now, but as soon as the current test is complete, I'll reboot and try the Disk Cleanup.

Usually, I know where the file is and what it's called, but this was done by someone in another group here. We thought we trained them enough, but obviously not. The program does not close the file until the video is stopped, whether by clicking on the "Stop video" button or closing the program. They just let it run overnight (or at least partly overnight) and didn't remember what they called it. Thanks for your replies. They really helped me out.

Ken

[Ben]

"We thought we trained them enough, but obviously not."

There is nothing fool-proof for a clever fool." (Author unknown).

Ben

[tst]

Also, make sure to display hidden files and folders, in case this file was created in one of them.

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@smercurio_fc wrote:

Rebooting, as Matt suggested, is not a bad suggestion. That seems to fix so many problems in Windows it's a wonder why we don't all choose to just leave the computers off.

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I'm not usually a fan of automatically bashing Microsoft and Windows, and I don't actually think Windows memory management is that bad (in fact, if I understand what I read correctly, it's much better than what Macs used to have), but at least that's funny.