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I went into comments to ponder how the app determines "unused files". I guess seeing access time is how? Could you elaborate on that? Are there customizeable t

I went into comments to ponder how the app determines "unused files". I guess seeing access time is how? Could you elaborate on that? Are there customizeable thresholds of some kind that I could set for this? I am immediately imagining a scenario where an app I use once in a while has its files deleted from app support folder because i use it so rarely.

simasscores 10mo ago
The app determines “unused” files by inspecting the filesystem metadata, specifically the creation date and last modification date of each file. It does not rely on last access time, since that approach would be unreliable on APFS. I was skeptical at first, but I’ve been using it constantly and it gives very useful suggestions. For example, some movie files I converted to a different format were flagged — the originals were already deleted, but the converted files were still lingering in ~/SmartConverter/Exports/Movies. There isn’t currently a customizable threshold you speak about, but that’s a great idea! I’m just launching the app, so I haven’t collected a lot of feedback or feature requests yet — thank you for the suggestion! The files in the app support folders you mentioned usually don’t take up much space, so they rarely appear at the top of the suggestions list. That said, occasionally MacSpaceBack may suggest a file you don’t want to delete — that’s why it includes the “Mute” feature, which lets you ignore suggestions for specific files. I view this app as a super quick way to reclaim a few gigabytes of data without spending a lot of time and for me it proven to be super helpful
- asimovDev 10mo ago
  That's quite interesting, thank you for answering. Not to put a lot on your plate, but have you considered creating a trial version that doesn't delete the files but just says how much space you can reclaim? I assume listing out the files wouldn't be very good cause then user can just go and manually delete the files without purchasing. maybe something like "87 files would be deleted to reclaims XY GB of space. Purchase now" or something along those lines.
- simasscores 10mo ago
  Yes, the trial mode is in my TODO list : ) Thanks again for your feedback! : )

simasscores 10mo ago

The app determines “unused” files by inspecting the filesystem metadata, specifically the creation date and last modification date of each file. It does not rely on last access time, since that approach would be unreliable on APFS. I was skeptical at first, but I’ve been using it constantly and it gives very useful suggestions. For example, some movie files I converted to a different format were flagged — the originals were already deleted, but the converted files were still lingering in ~/SmartConverter/Exports/Movies. There isn’t currently a customizable threshold you speak about, but that’s a great idea! I’m just launching the app, so I haven’t collected a lot of feedback or feature requests yet — thank you for the suggestion! The files in the app support folders you mentioned usually don’t take up much space, so they rarely appear at the top of the suggestions list. That said, occasionally MacSpaceBack may suggest a file you don’t want to delete — that’s why it includes the “Mute” feature, which lets you ignore suggestions for specific files. I view this app as a super quick way to reclaim a few gigabytes of data without spending a lot of time and for me it proven to be super helpful

asimovDev 10mo ago
That's quite interesting, thank you for answering. Not to put a lot on your plate, but have you considered creating a trial version that doesn't delete the files but just says how much space you can reclaim? I assume listing out the files wouldn't be very good cause then user can just go and manually delete the files without purchasing. maybe something like "87 files would be deleted to reclaims XY GB of space. Purchase now" or something along those lines.
simasscores 10mo ago
Yes, the trial mode is in my TODO list : ) Thanks again for your feedback! : )