Linux Tip: Finding out how big a directory is

At the terminal, if you are wondering how big a directory is you can enter the following command to find out;

du -sh /home/user/interesting_directory/

Obviously replace "/home/user/interesting_directory/" with the location you are interested in.

If you leave off the location it will measure the current directory

du is the "disk usage" tool, option '-s' is for sum, and "-h" is human readable format.

Executing this command in my home directory reports back:
405M

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