this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2024
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I was trying to analyze my phone's storage through Filelight, but it just gets frozen after I select the phone's folder. I didn't find anything in Bugzilla regarding this problem.
Is the protocol supported at all in the app?

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

The MTP protocol is notoriously slow, as it will not multiplex block operations unlike traditional filesystems. It will not be able to process multiple files in parallel or asynchronously, which means the software can only check one file at a time.

So Filelight can probably handle it, but it will be highly inefficient and that would explain why the software appears frozen.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Oh, I didn't know that! It would kinda makes sense now that you say that, but I'm not too sure about this, the system resources taken by the app seem like they don't change at all when I start the scan and it's impossible to abort it (actually, I can't do anything, not even close the window, only terminating the app works).
If this is an actual issue I should probably report it, maybe there's more tests I can run?


Otherwise, do you know if there are similar apps (either GUI or CLI) that handle this better? Better in the sense that maybe it's still really slow, but, well, not freezing at least lol.
Or if I just have to find something to use on Android directly, like SD Maid

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Resource usage is expected to stay minimal as there will be no multithreating possible, if I understood the comment correctly.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Yes, i got that, but isn't it still abnormal behavior not to respond to user input while performing the operation?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Yes it is, I dont know the technical details but KDE tends to freeze a lot. I dont know if it is impossible? Why cant apps just have a UI that always works, and the process may freeze doesnt matter?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

I don't think you can fix that, it's how MTP was designed.

Something on-device would have direct access to the filesystem, or at least the abstraction wouldn't be as slow as MTP.

Something like disky could do?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Yeah, I guess there's nothing to be done there.
Thanks for the app suggestion, I've never seen it before, it looks really promising!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

In my experience mtp (especially on Linux) stops working if you look at it wrong, so probably not. Perhaps kde connect's folder view works?

I'd run gdu in termux on the phone though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

In my experience mtp (especially on Linux) stops working if you look at it wrong, so probably not.

Haha, that may be, I've never done anything aside from just moving and copying files with it luckily, so I don't really know.

Perhaps kde connect’s folder view works?

Interesting idea, I should try that!

I’d run gdu in termux on the phone though.

Ooo, you just unlocked a fabulous CLI tool for me that I didn't know about!
Does it work on the whole phone storage? I remember there being a symlink (?) to the user's home in Termux's folder, but I'm wondering if it'll leave something out

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Gdu doesn't follow folder symlinks and can't scan what it doesn't have permission to (like system folders and other apps) but if you cd to internalstorage it can scan that

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Makes sense

[–] G020B 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I tried Filelight with my phone connected through KDE Connect and I can confirm that it works!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Wow, that's really neat! Seeing something so flexible as an underlying architecture for KDE apps is a pleasure

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

I don't think so. But you can simply use a Android native app like disky to accomplish the same task

[–] possiblylinux127 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Could you just use the built in android tool?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] possiblylinux127 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Its under settings -> storage

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Oh, that. It's true that it's similar and it's not bad either, but I really like the kind of insight Filelight gives, with its folder sunburst view especially. It's more complete, since it shows everything, not just what it thinks I should get rid of.
Disky, mentioned by others, is the closest to that, as far as I've seen. It's really good and you can have the same experience on it regardless of the ROM you're using, since it's just a normal app instead of a vendor dependent system app