https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner
A script that scrubs the document version history from OS X systems
https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner
cleaner cleanup osx versions versions-cleaner
Last synced: 5 months ago
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A script that scrubs the document version history from OS X systems
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner
- Owner: chrissimpkins
- License: mit
- Created: 2015-06-03T02:40:37.000Z (over 10 years ago)
- Default Branch: master
- Last Pushed: 2017-11-13T00:44:34.000Z (almost 8 years ago)
- Last Synced: 2025-03-30T16:12:00.064Z (6 months ago)
- Topics: cleaner, cleanup, osx, versions, versions-cleaner
- Language: Python
- Homepage:
- Size: 11.7 KB
- Stars: 45
- Watchers: 5
- Forks: 4
- Open Issues: 0
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- License: LICENSE
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README
# OS X Versions Cleaner
A script that scrubs the document version history from OS X systems.
**Warning**: This script deletes all previous versions of all documents for all applications that use OS X document versioning. Please understand what you are doing and confirm that you do not need prior versions before you use this script. A Time Machine backup is highly recommended prior to use.
It **does not** delete the current versions of these documents.
## Background
The OS X Versions feature provides an automatic document versioning tool that allows you to recover up to *hundreds* of prior document changes in commonly used applications such as Pages, Preview, Numbers, as well as in many third party applications. Not all users require this feature and [in certain cases](https://medium.com/thomasdegry/how-sketch-took-over-200gb-of-our-macbooks-cb7dd10c8163) it leads to the loss of a significant amount of storage space on your system (hundreds of GB). This feature was introduced in OS X Lion and Apple documentation is available [here](https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202255).
This script eliminates all stored document versions from your Mac OSX v 10.7+ system (OSX Lion through current).
## Instructions
### Dependency
Requires Python v2.x or v3.x
### Get the Script
You can manually download a [zip archive](https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner/archive/master.zip) or [tar archive](https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner/archive/master.tar.gz) of the repository
or pull the repository to your machine with git:
```sh
git clone https://github.com/chrissimpkins/macosx-versions-cleaner.git
```
### Usage
Navigate to the `version_cleaner.py` file in the repository and execute the command:
```sh
sudo python version_cleaner.py
```
The script will ask if you would like to reboot to complete the cleanup process. Enter `y` or `n`.
If you choose not to reboot your system, you will not be able to save document versions in applications that use them until you perform a manual reboot.
### Discontinue Future Versioning in Applications
Use the following command in your terminal application:
```sh
defaults write -app ‘’ ApplePersistence -bool no
```
replacing `` with the application that uses the Versions feature.
### Cleanup
You can safely delete the entire OS X Versions Cleaner repository after use. Or, keep it around to use down the road when document versions pile up again.