Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!think!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!hplabs!sdcrdcf!csun!polyslo!dorourke
From: dorourke@polyslo.UUCP (David O'Rourke)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Why can't the Finder show folder sizes?
Message-ID: <3211@polyslo.UUCP>
Date: 18 Jun 88 11:21:18 GMT
References: <5173@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Reply-To: dorourke@polyslo.UUCP (David O'Rourke)
Organization: Cal Poly State University -- San Luis Obispo
Lines: 20

In article <5173@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> matthews@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu (Dave Matthews) writes:
>The worst thing is, I *know* the Finder knows that information.  If you do a 
>Get Info on the folder, there it is.  The stubborn thing just refuses to show 
>it in a simple list.  How frustrating!

  Have you ever noticed the large amount of disk access after you choose
get info on a folder.  I don't know this for a fact, but I assume that the
finder is traversing the tree to add up all of the bytes in this folder.  So
the finder doesn't "know" the folder size, it just figures it out for you
when you choose get info.  Try it with about 60 files, and some folders with
files in them and you will notice a large lag time while the finder calculates
the folder size.  It is this lag time that prevents the finder from displaying
the folder size in a list.  I guess they didn't want to make you wait for the
traversal of each folder just to show you the size in the list.


-- 
David M. O'Rourke

Disclaimer: I don't represent the school.  All opinions are mine!