Tallying is the process where Interrogator reads directories and file information
for display.
This process takes time, and so the information is not always available
when a window first shows up.
The display changes according to what is known about
the fiiles and directories displayed.
To maximize display speed, Interrogator keeps a tally cache of information about
the filesystem. It is continually being updated from the actual disks and directories.
This process illustrates what happens when Interrogator starts up. You can see
a similar display in the Inspector window; click on the green bar for a Tallying
job (the one named front is usually a good choice).
This is why you might notice a lot of disk activity when Interrogator first starts up. After several minutes, this subsides. You can adjust some of the settings in the Preferences to control this. And, if you leave Interrogator on all the time, the caches will be kept up to date automatically.
Interrogator's tallying tends to follow you around - that is, it tallies the directories displayed in your frontmost window, and their direct and indirect subdirectories. To a lesser extent it also tallies other open windows. The root window is usually very tedious, triggering lots of tallying underneath because of all of the broad subdirectories it typically has.
Note: The Inspector window only shows as depicted on the right, above. The tree structure on the left, and the laser beams, are just an artist's conception.
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Normally, Interrogator tallies only what it needs to, such as directories that are
being displayed in a window. It also tallies subdirectories, down to a certain depth;
this is how it calculates total directory size.
If you want to specifically ask Interrogator to tally a directory, either because it hasn't been tallied or because there have been changes that it hasn't noticed yet, use the Tally command. (It is also on the View menu.) You can request as many levels deep as you want. The Tally command will create another job in the Inspector window; you can view its progress there.
Documentation > Tallying |
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