Upgrading (the EEEPC) with low disk space

When, while installing Xubuntu, I decided EEEPC disk partitioning I based my decision on previous installation typical disk usage worrying mostly about “/home” and “/usr” partitions. I never would have thought about running out of space in the root “/” partition.

Then, the first time I tried to upgrade to latest Xubuntu distribution I got an error message about disk free space on partition being not enough to download distribution files (that usually take a little less than 1GB of disk space). Examining disk free space I discovered that very little free space was left on the root partition even if it was more then enough after my post-installation check.

Fortunately AskUbuntu came quickly at recover: here I quickly found a question asked from who had the same problem. To be precise the question was about problems with “/boot” partition low disk space bat I suppose it was because of a different partitioning schema, by the way solution worked for me.

Cleaning “apt-get” leftovers

As I learned from AskUbuntu question some of the “lost” disk space might be occupied by unused files or apt-get temporary files. So simply by executing the following commands …

sudo apt-get autoremove

sudo apt-get clean

some disk space can be set free.

Removing old Linux kernel images

If free space gained from the previous operation isn't enough some more space can be obtained by removing old Linux kernel images. Every time Ubuntu upgrade to e new kernel release the old one is kept available in to be used to solve possible compatibility issues. Such feature is scarcely user and is of no use at all in the eve of a major distribution upgrade.

First the currently used Linux kernel must be identified the command …

uname -a

does the job, here is the current output

Linux eeepc900 4.4.0-21-generic #37-Ubuntu SMP Mon Apr 18 18:34:49 UTC 2016 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux

while the command …

dpkg -l 'linux-image*'

lists all Linux kernel images currently installed, here is a sample output:

Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold

| Status=Not/Inst/Conf-files/Unpacked/halF-conf/Half-inst/trig-aWait/Trig-pend

|/ Err?=(none)/Reinst-required (Status,Err: uppercase=bad)

||/ Name Version Architecture Description

+++-==============-============-============-=================================

un linux-image <none> <none> (no description available)

un linux-image-3. <none> <none> (no description available)

rc linux-image-3. 3.19.0-15.15 i386 Linux kernel image for version 3.

rc linux-image-3. 3.19.0-28.30 i386 Linux kernel image for version 3.

rc linux-image-3. 3.19.0-33.38 i386 Linux kernel image for version 3.

rc linux-image-3. 3.19.0-43.49 i386 Linux kernel image for version 3.

ii linux-image-3. 3.19.0-56.62 i386 Linux kernel image for version 3.

ii linux-image-4. 4.2.0-34.39 i386 Linux kernel image for version 4.

ii linux-image-4. 4.4.0-21.37 i386 Linux kernel image for version 4.

rc linux-image-ex 3.19.0-15.15 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

rc linux-image-ex 3.19.0-28.30 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

rc linux-image-ex 3.19.0-33.38 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

rc linux-image-ex 3.19.0-43.49 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

ii linux-image-ex 3.19.0-56.62 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

ii linux-image-ex 4.2.0-34.39 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

ii linux-image-ex 4.4.0-21.37 i386 Linux kernel extra modules for ve

ii linux-image-ge 4.4.0.21.22 i386 Generic Linux kernel image

eventually older kernel images can be removed with an “apt-get” command like the following, changing of course the version number

sudo apt-get -y purge linux-image-x.yy.z-tt-generic linux-image-extra-x.yy.z-tt-generic linux-headers-x.yy.z-tt linux-headers-x.yy.z-tt-generic

If you look deeper in AskUbuntu answer you'll see that more complex scripts can be used to make the operation faster. I stopped here, I don't like automating too much when deleting things and, after all, this it's I problem I get into at most twice a year. So … I can do it manually