Du

Unlike other operating systems, such as Linux, Windows does not pack a built-in utility that provides statistics for the usage of the files or directories. Du is a lightweight CLI utility that has the role of recursively identifying folders that take up a significant amount of space on your hard drives.

The utility can come in handy when you are trying to figure out where all the disk space went, particularly when you start receiving notifications from the OS that you are running low on space. Another situation when it can come in handy is to show the effective disk space used so that you can trim down the virtual desktop images.

Functionality-wise, the program works with simple commands where you specify the path of the directory or drive that you want to analyze. You should bear in mind that the app recurses lists to display the total size of all its content by default. Then again, if this is not the type of data you need for the current project, you can use the -n command to skip it.

As you probably hinted, the tool works just as well for sub-directories, in case you have the suspicion that there might be malware hiding somewhere deep in the folders. You can specify the sub-directory depth of information via the -l command, as the default value is applicable for all levels.

The utility can provide the details in a CSV report and, ensuring that you make regular reports, you may be able to detect malicious software as well as potential leaks in the applications that you are developing.

Whether you are looking to learn more about how space is used on your computer or analyze behaviors of specialized apps that you are developing, Du can come in handy.