Several of us, which I found out by reading comments here, have each developed on our own our little utility to do the same thing: clean up / deduplicate / get rid of old files.
And it's not just a matter of using fdupes or jdupes: I created a database where I tag files based on their cryptographic hash (and size, for speed). For example a file can be tagged as "file with that hash can always be deleted" or "file with that hash can always be renamed to xxx".
I then can run my "bezerker" on entire filesystems and it'll delete files tagged for deletion.
I used the Blake3 hash for speed but I also saved which hash is used, so if something much faster comes up, I can switch (I'd still need to use Blake3 for the hashes already in the DB but that's no issue).
I did this because I got tired of having for example the wife and mother-in-law coming with yet another USB stick, with yet another "directory inside a directory inside a directory with family pictures and movies from 2017" or whatever and having to delete for the ten times that same blurry picture or that same little 3 seconds movie taken by mistake etc.
So, basically, instead of lamenting, in that xkcd 1360 style, about old files and old directories, I made my own little utility to get rid of the problem once and for all.
Works wonder but as you asked: it's really for my own use and I kept it private.
That said I take it there's at least some interest in a public / open-source utility doing that: otherwise there wouldn't be several of us here on HN (and certainly elsewhere too) developing our own solution for this problem.
https://xkcd.com/1360/
Several of us, which I found out by reading comments here, have each developed on our own our little utility to do the same thing: clean up / deduplicate / get rid of old files.
And it's not just a matter of using fdupes or jdupes: I created a database where I tag files based on their cryptographic hash (and size, for speed). For example a file can be tagged as "file with that hash can always be deleted" or "file with that hash can always be renamed to xxx".
I then can run my "bezerker" on entire filesystems and it'll delete files tagged for deletion.
I used the Blake3 hash for speed but I also saved which hash is used, so if something much faster comes up, I can switch (I'd still need to use Blake3 for the hashes already in the DB but that's no issue).
I did this because I got tired of having for example the wife and mother-in-law coming with yet another USB stick, with yet another "directory inside a directory inside a directory with family pictures and movies from 2017" or whatever and having to delete for the ten times that same blurry picture or that same little 3 seconds movie taken by mistake etc.
So, basically, instead of lamenting, in that xkcd 1360 style, about old files and old directories, I made my own little utility to get rid of the problem once and for all.
Works wonder but as you asked: it's really for my own use and I kept it private.
That said I take it there's at least some interest in a public / open-source utility doing that: otherwise there wouldn't be several of us here on HN (and certainly elsewhere too) developing our own solution for this problem.