BlueHarvest Lite

BlueHarvest Lite requires you to select each disk you wish to keep clean. This is to comply with Apple's App Store restrictions. BlueHarvest has the ability to clean each disk connected to your Mac without specifically choosing it first. BlueHarvest Lite cannot clean zip archives.

.DS_Store files are created by OS X to store metadata about folders and files including viewing options, icon positions and color labels. ._ AppleDouble files are created by the OS X when an application adds resource data or metadata to a file on a disk whose format doesn't support resources or metadata.

Yes. Some applications rely on data stored in ._ AppleDouble files (for example legacy MacOS fonts or EPS files). These files will be made unusable if their ._ AppleDouble file is deleted. Always make sure you use BlueHarvest with files which don't rely on data in ._ AppleDouble files. If there are particular file types for which you don’t wish to have the AppleDouble file removed for, you can click the “Whitelist” button in the BlueHarvest preferences.

• Files beginning with "._" (called AppleDouble files)
• Files which match a UNIX wildcard string e.g "*.blah"
• ".DS_Store" files
• ".fseventsd" folders
• ".Spotlight-V100" folders
• ".TemporaryItems" folders
• ".Trashes" folders

The last four items cannot be deleted from network servers.

No. The ".AppleDouble" folders are created by the NAS device not by OS X. They are also kept invisible to OS X by the NAS which sadly means BlueHarvest is unable to delete them. Please contact your NAS vendor for information on how to hide these files on all platforms.

BlueHarvest only removes resources and metadata from non Mac disks or servers.

Open Console.app inside the /Applications/Utilities folder and click Console.log on the left. BlueHarvest will print a message whenever it deletes something.