Talk:List of defragmentation software

Ideas for a comparison table

I'm OK with adding a table, just as long as we keep the list (this is still a List of article, after all). We can also break the list down by platform support and license, too. Here's my first draft:

Program	Author	License	Supported file systems	Supported platforms
Contig	Sysinternals / Microsoft	Freeware	NTFS	Microsoft Windows
Diskeeper	Diskeeper Corporation	Commercial	FAT16, FAT32, NTFS	Microsoft Windows
Program	Author	License	Supported file systems	Supported platforms

— EagleOne\^Talk 22:29, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Would be useful to have a "Comparison" article for this, like other articles in the "Software comparisons" category - Zarano (talk) 23:20, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree, the above table can be implemented. --Hm2k (talk) 10:08, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Supported platforms

When listing supported platforms, most operating systems do not need separate defragmenting software. It is possible that only DOS and Windows variants need listing. This may influence the best naming of column headings, number of columns, or column format. Thank you. Jerryobject (talk) 16:07, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Defragmentation scheme

Considering some computers have 8 GB of RAM or more, it occurred to me that in portions of the drive that are heavily fragmented, it would be far superior for a defragger to read a whole multi-gigabyte swath of the disk sequentially, defrag it in RAM, then write the swath back out. I have searched for this idea but haven't found whether any defraggers use such schemes. It might be good for this defragmentation software listing to have information on whether any defraggers use this or any other similar strategies, if applicable. -Rolypolyman (talk) 13:27, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

That wouldn't work without exclusive control of the partition, i.e. would have to unmount it first. And it wouldn't be safeguarded by the OS's defrag API.

Moving one file at a time, but in larger chunks at a time (say, up to 512 megabytes if plenty of RAM is available) would be a more conservative approach, and still cut down on HDD seeks. Oops, WP:OR on my part... 217.254.170.38 (talk) 16:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

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--Hm2k (talk) 09:12, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Auslogics Disk Defrag "Shareware"?

Excuse me? This is to be disputed. This software is labeled in software as "free for personal use". You need to look at the site yourself.

It is part of the much-larger software package, "BoostSpeed", which is available for purchase.
--205.214.244.235 (talk) 02:40, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I am confused by what you are asking, and you don't provide any links to support your case. To quote the Wikipedia's shareware article:

"The term shareware is used in contrast to retail software, which refers to commercial software available only with the purchase of a license which may not be copied for others, public domain software, which refers to software not copyright protected, and freeware, which refers to copyrighted software for which the author solicits no payment (though he or she may request donations)."

Are you suggesting we relabel Auslogics Disk Defrag as commercial software? Or as freeware? Because it's not retail/commercial if you can download it for free, and it's not freeware when the usage rights are limited to personal use only. —Voidxor (talk | contrib) 04:09, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

In-Table vs. Off-Table

It appears that there is an intentional split between defragmentation software that appears within the table and others that are not in the table that, instead, appear under the heading Other (sub-headings: Commercial; Shareware; Freeware; and, Open source). It is not clear to me why the latter are not included in the main table unless, perhaps, it is wanting time and effort to do so. Can anyone see a reason why the "Other" defragmentation software is NOT included in the main comparison table?!? If not, I assume there is no objection to moving all the "Other" defragmentation software into the main table and deleting the "Other" section entirely. Comments?
Enquire (talk) 01:33, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

In my experience with this article, you are exactly right! The article was divided when I came along, but (looking at the history) the table has been growing while the list has been shrinking. I concur that it's only lacking somebody's time to integrate the remaining defragmenters. Since you brought it up, I'll let you have first dibs on doing the work; otherwise I can contribute my effort.

Oh, so the List of defragmentation software needs defragmentation ... I get it ... LOL!

Enquire (talk) 07:42, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Note that many software categories have "List of…" or "Comparison of…" articles. However, the moment this article loses its unordered list completely, it needs to be moved to Comparison of defragmentation software. I've seen this distinction argued on talk pages before. Learning from those discussions, editors don't like there to be a "Comparison of…" article with no corresponding "List of…" article. Eventually the List of defragmentation software would be recreated with bullet points. Perhaps the better course of action would be to split the table into Comparison of defragmentation software, and then expand both it and the list to include all defragmenters. —voidxor (talk | contrib) 05:10, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, this article should be forked, with the ideal end-point being two articles:

1. This article reverted to a simple unordered list; AND,
2. This article (also) moved to Comparison of defragmentation software with all defraggers incorporated into a table.

Presumably, then, these two articles should cross-link. However, I would have thought that a comparison article would somewhat make the list article redundant; since in an ideal world it would always be nice to be able re-sort a list based on criteria of interest to the reader ... AKA a sortable table...

On the other hand, if the preferred approach would be to have both a "List of…" AS WELL AS a "Comparison of…" article, then we would need to do a proper fork without loosing histories etc (i.e. NOT copy and paste job, which is verboten). I have in the past renamed or moved an article successfully, but not for a while. Certainly, I have not attempted to fork an article. So if that is what is required and you know how to do that correctly, please take the lead (and feel free to point me to the help page describing how it is done for my future reference).

Enquire (talk) 07:23, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

You're basically correct, although the word "revert" on Wikipedia implies undoing the most recent edit(s). What you called "forking" is called "splitting" on Wikipedia. The difference is that you don't retain the history and talk page in both articles (that would be confusingly redundant). Nor do you "move" this article to Comparison of defragmentation software; instead you cut and paste just the comparison table. Then the missing defraggers would need to be added to each of the two articles. The articles would indeed cross-link. Good point about a "List of…" being redundant of a "Comparison of…". I've made that point before but some Wikipedians like a good-ol' bulleted list to navigate the software articles. So the basic guideline is that if you have a "Comparison of…" article, you need a corresponding "List of…" article.

Please be mindful not to insert your replies into another editor's signed post. It makes the discussion hard to follow.

I'd be glad to take the lead, but it may be a few days before I get to it (homework comes first!). For your future reference, see Wikipedia:Splitting and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (stand-alone lists). —voidxor (talk | contrib) 07:25, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Update: I'm done with finals, so I now have the time to take this on. I'll tag the Comparison section for splitting and wait a few days to see if anybody objects. —voidxor (talk | contrib) 05:46, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Table Width / Table Structure

I wonder if the table as presented is too wide and if, perhaps, it should be broken into two smaller tables (although that inevitably leads to duplication of data, and the possibility of data conflicts). However now, increasingly, users have wide screens, so this is probably not really an issue. Are their guidelines on maximum table widths in Wikipedia?
I also note that clicking on sort by Stable Release leads to a meaningless sort (try it, and you will see what I mean). This can easily be fixed by simply putting the date first (ISO format) followed by the version number in parenthesis, for example 2010-12-15 (v3.4.1). That way the most recent releases (updates) would be at the top (or bottom) and the oldest release at the other end ... this would then be a meaningful sort.
Also, if we have room to add columns (in spite of the preceeding), it would be nice to have separate columns for Windows, Mac and Linux. That way users can quickly sort by OS. I know that Mac and Win 7 have on-the-fly defragmentation, but there is still need to periodically do (say) a boot defraghmentation, etc. or defragmentation of external or attached drives, and these are available ... though only, so far, one Mac defragger is currently included (in the list portion).
Enquire (talk) 07:35, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

On table width, keep in mind that columns keep being added (look at the history). So yes, tables that grow horizontally will need to be split at some point. The only redundancy would be the program name in the first column of both tables. We cannot assume that all users have wide screens. The table does scale (horizontally) to the browser window by using as many line breaks as required. If you shrink your browser window horizontally, you'll find the lower limit of the scaling. I was hoping to find a guideline on that, but all I found was Wikipedia:Manual of Style (tables) and no mention of maximum table width. In any case, I don't want to worry about this until after I've split the article as per the above discussion.

On sorting the stable-release column, I am reluctant to change the current format which is the standard format used in Comparison of BitTorrent clients and Comparison of e-mail clients, for example.

On multiple OS columns, my opinion is that it would be overkill and exacerbate the table width problem. You'd still need to list which versions of each OS are supported, and that precludes using Yes/No and prevents proper sorting anyway. —voidxor (talk | contrib) 07:37, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Undue weight Microsoft FS

The article currently only lists software for Microsoft systems (with one OS X exception). I added [1] Btrfs to broaden to include Linux. This was reverted by User:Voidxor [2] with "Revert addition of see-also link: most modern file systems implement defragmentation, whether online or not, so unless you care to list them all under ==See also==, it looks like spam. Also, avoid piping see-also links per WP:EASTEREGG".

• Currently the article is undue weight to MS filesystems (FAT NTFS) - I tagged as such
  • This is partly understandable due to being more susceptible to fragmentation (not age of filesystem so much but susceptibility)
• Defragmentation#Approach and defragmenters by file-system type has plenty of other (potentially) notable defragment
  • Btrfs standing out in terms of notability with XFS
• Since when is [[Btrfs#Features|Btrfs]] EASTEREGGy? Nope.
• "Spam" is just rubbish
• Having to list them all is too
• Would you care to revert yourself or possibly better put outside the see also in the list? Widefox; talk 08:19, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Let's just redefine this to "List of Windows defragmentation software" and get this over with. The way defragmentation is handled on Windows is very different from other operating systems -- there is an API that user space applications can use to rearrange files; the real heavy-lifting is actually done by operating system, not the defrag software. This has allowed so many such tools to spawn up. As you say, there is only 1 entry for Mac defragmentation software, which has been discontinued since 2004.

On Linux, defragmentation is an intimate detail of the file system and not some 3rd party software that can be bolted on. There's no public "defrag API" and it's unlikely there will be one soon. So it makes sense to talk about defragmentation in the context of file systems, not in terms of distinct "defragmentation software". -- intgr [talk] 11:12, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Well, reducing the scope to just Windows is not the right direction according to WP:Scope. It's the difference in demand for defragmenting rather than API details that's crucial. Fragmentation is purely a FS issue. As notability is not temporary there's no justification for removing the OS X entry either. So no we shouldn't give undue weight to any OS or ignore the educational value of providing encyclopedic coverage of this general FS issue by restricting to one system or FS. There's an NPOV / undue weight either way. Certainly consider attempts to widen according to the current named scope as "spam" is questionable and currently unjustified. Widefox; talk 04:19, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Intgr had a good suggestion with a move to List of Windows defragmentation software being a simple approach to a complex problem. I am learning how very differently OS X handles defragmentation. To be fair, a filesystem hardly belongs within the scope of an article listing "software" (literally as the article is currently named). True, Widefox named a filesystem with special defragmentation properties. But if we go so far as to list such filesystems, why not canvas the majority of Linux filesystems which are fragmentation resistant as well? Perhaps instead of renaming this article and messing with scope concerns, a List of self-defragmenting filesystems article could be created and cross linked.

Please do not take my concerns expressed in my edit summary personally. It's not that the filesystem is easter-eggy, it's that piped links are. I believe my edit summary to be clear in that aspect. I define spam as the promotion of one product or solution over a litany of comparable ones. Linking to just one of the hundreds of available filesystems caught my eye in this way. At the time, I was unaware of any special self-defragmenting attribute. I will restore the original see-also link with a little description to alleviate my concerns. – voidxor ^{(talk | contrib)} 05:28, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

It is simple - the scope is OS and FS neutral per all the related articles. I repeat, what reason have you got to ignore or fork per wp:scope? Unless there is let's move forward... Similarly, we shouldn't conflate "Software" with "software package" / "application software" so what's the reason to reduce the scope to packages only? These two assumptions are not made in the other articles, so the burden is to justify them.

As for easter-egg - can you point to where piping section links is eastereggy? The visible link is the same and the article title! (I reformatted above to clarify) That's nonsense. You were clear and understood, just an incorrect interpretation IMHO. No offense. There's already piped entries in the list anyhow. Please check WP:SPAM for what we agree spam is before branding others edits spam. It's completely fine to not know about something, but getting in the way of fixing undue / NPOV issues is another issue. If I find time, I will add more to fix the undue, please don't remove the maintenance template again until this is more balanced. Done Widefox; talk 09:50, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Please calm down, Widefox. I have already explained my concerns and reinstated your link in a way that addressed them. There is no need to be so confrontational. Intgr had similar concerns with your original edit, so I am unsure why you are attacking me. Use of "nonsince", "incorrect interpretation", and "not to know about something" is a highly confrontational tone. I only reverted one of your edits, and then partially reinstated it. I'm here discussing the issue on the talk page, aren't I? What exactly is that "getting in the way of"?! Your authority to edit as you see fit without one, much less two, editors objecting?

We simply disagree on the definition of "defragmentation software". In my opinion, the adjective "defragmentation" narrows the list down to software which has the primary function of defragmentation, not file storage. Naturally I understand that filesystems and operating systems are software too.

I only removed the maintenance template because I thought reinstating the Btrfs link in the see-also section would satisfy your original intent. I was clearly wrong, as you decided to move the link into the article body and chew me out for my utter inability to read your mind. By "spam" I merely meant that it appeared as if somebody was promoting one filesystem over all others. Piping links is not "eastereggy" most of the time, but I do worry when readers can click a bare link to a filesystem they want to know more about, and be directed to a specific section of it without knowing why they aren't at the lede of the article whose name they just clicked on. My meaning was honestly that innocent. I would not use such terms if I thought they would cause undue offense to be taken, but unfortunately edit summaries cannot be modified. I'm sorry for crossing your path, so please drop the issue and subsequent campaign of insulting my intelligence. – voidxor ^{(talk | contrib)} 05:31, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Sure no problem. I thought I said working it into the list was the aim. No problem. I agree we've moved past the original revert, and possibly the idea of reducing the scope - more eyeballs might say reducing is the right way to go, I do not know. Sure I can understand the reasoning as Windows defrags are more notable, and others notable in their near absence if you know what I mean. Yes you've been great and we've moved forward from that. My robust disagreement including examples and guidelines is purely because of my attempt to move forward from what I see as a local consensus here - as you correctly state I'm against the consensus, so rely on pointing out guidelines/essays to get us back on the same page / track here. The issue of notability for non-MS FSs is interesting for readers in that they get fragmented, there is software out there (there's at least one commercial "package" for Linux which probably isn't notable). As for the definition of software - yes that's clear we don't agree - software is software, whether it is a FS kernel driver in kernel space, userspace, a bundled command tool, a separate tool, up to commercial packages. Put it like this, we're not a guide for what to go get, we list what software can defrag, possibly including autodefrag in Btrfs but certainly the manual defrag so we're covered anyhow for the entry. How's that sound? Widefox; talk 11:46, 30 August 2013 (UTC)