Show folder full file size in bytes in the file properties
Affected version
- Nightly flatpak: Can't test it because I can't install it because my /home is out of space
- Other: Pop!_OS 21.10 | GNOME Files 40.2 (also checked on Fedora 37 / GNOME Files 43)
Use cases
I work in video production. In the offloading/backup process, I will make at least two copies of large media folders, to at least two different external hard drives. To be really sure that the offloading/backup was successful, without any corruption, I need to check the size of these copies in bytes, as, in some rare cases, an offloading app may confirm that a transfer was success but corruption may still have occurred.
So when I work on macOS, on Finder, I open the file properties of each of the copies, side by side, to manually check if they match in bytes (in the case of same drive model and filesystem) or are just a few bytes or kilobytes off (in the case of different filesystems), which indicate to me that no corruption has occurred.
But in GNOME Files, in the file properties dialog of folders, the full size in bytes is not displayed:
Available features and workarounds
There are no workarounds that I know of, currently.
I guess I could use the command line, but that would be too many extra steps, and prone to mistakes considering I would have to make extra sure I typed the right paths, which is counter-productive since media management during video production requires working really fast.
Difficulties and insufficiencies
I can't check whether two folders match in size (in bytes).
Suggested enhancements
Solutions:
- Display the full file size in bytes, in the file properties dialog, like on Finder:
- Add a "Compare" option that brings up a dialog that lets you select one or multiple source folders/files plus other folders/files to compare against the the source folder(s)/file(s). It would display their full sizes in bytes stacked on top of each other, in the color green if they match against the source folder(s)/file(s), and in the color red if they don't.