How to correctly obtain storage information?

[Pooffick]

Hi @artehe!

I tried using the GetStorageDetails method in DiagnosticsService, but I get the error "Failed to query MobileGestalt; deprecated as of iOS >= 17.4." I couldn't find any other ways to get storage info. Are there any, or have I searched poorly?
I found another option via ideviceinfo -q com.apple.disk_usage (libimobiledevice/libimobiledevice#1046), but it seems to be not implemented in your library.

I hope for your help!

[Pooffick]

I got some values ​​via lockdown.GetValue("com.apple.disk_usage", null)?.AsDictionaryNode(), but I can't figure out what to map them to.
I'd like to display the data like on a MacBook, where there are photos/data/system/free space, etc.

[artehe]

I think now that mobilegestalt is deprecated you need to use a combination of lockdown and ioregistry so something like:

DiagnosticsService.IORegistry();

I don't entirely know what values to look for in here as I've not really used it. Then combine it with:

lockdown.GetValue("com.apple.disk_usage", null)?.AsDictionaryNode(),

then Just parse this dictionary into the object that you want.

[Pooffick]

Thanks!
I'll check DiagnosticsService.IORegistry();

I also found this comment in one of the issues:

atm. for applications i use installation proxy
for ibooks i just calculate size of files in ibooks folders, same for other media (since music and video files are in itunes_control folder, and photos in dcim and photodata)
calculating size by traversing filesystem is quite time consuming tho'

I hope I don't have to go through all the files, but this might be the only option.

[Pooffick]

@artehe hi again!
I'm not very familiar with reverse engineering Apple devices.
How difficult is it to implement the AirTraffic client (com.apple.atc) and query AssetMetrics? I see it's not implemented in libimobiledevice. (https://libimobiledevice.org/status/)

[artehe]

@artehe hi again! I'm not very familiar with reverse engineering Apple devices. How difficult is it to implement the AirTraffic client (com.apple.atc) and query AssetMetrics? I see it's not implemented in libimobiledevice. (https://libimobiledevice.org/status/)

Short answer is no idea.

I don't know what this is or does. If there's something somewhere which someone else has already done then it can be put in quite easily. Otherwise I'm not entirely sure how to go about implementing it.

[Elanchezhiyan-P]

Hi @Pooffick,

In this library, there are basically two ways to work with storage:

1. Overall storage information (total capacity, free space, etc.)

You can query com.apple.disk_usage via lockdown, similar to:

ideviceinfo -q com.apple.disk_usage

Example in code:

  using var lockdown = MobileDevice.CreateUsingUsbmux(serial);

  var disk = lockdown
     .GetValue("com.apple.disk_usage", null)?
     .AsDictionaryNode();

  if (disk != null)
  {
    var total = disk["TotalDiskCapacity"]
        .AsIntegerNode()
        .Value; // bytes

    var free = disk["AvailableDiskCapacity"]
        .AsIntegerNode()
        .Value; // bytes
  } 

This gives you enough data to display things like:

“64 GB total, X GB free”

2. Accessing actual files and folders

• Use AfcService for general device storage (e.g. DCIM, iTunes_Control, etc.)
• Use HouseArrestService for app sandboxes

Example using AFC:

   using var lockdown = MobileDevice.CreateUsingUsbmux(serial);
   using var afc = new AfcService(lockdown);

   var entries = await afc.GetDirectoryList(
      "/DCIM",
      CancellationToken.None
   );

Notes on category breakdowns

If you need storage breakdowns by category (apps, photos, etc.), you’ll need to:

• Combine the keys from com.apple.disk_usage
• Manually sum file sizes in relevant directories via AFC

There’s no single API that provides a full category breakdown automatically.

[Pooffick]

Hi @Elanchezhiyan-P, thanks for your reply!
So, I ended up doing this:
For general information I use lockdown.GetValue("com.apple.disk_usage", null)?.AsDictionaryNode(): TotalDiskCapacity, AmountDataAvailable and TotalSystemCapacity.
For information about applications - InstallationProxyService with BrowseByPages method.
Photos - AfcService, folders ./PhotoData and ./DCIM.
Books - AfcService, folders ./Books and ./iBooks.
Audio - AfcService, folder ./iTunes_Control.
I check file extensions and sum up the sizes. It's a bit slow and doesn't exactly match the actual size on the device, but it works more or less.