CleanApp 2.3.1 — An enhanced variant of an application removal tool                    

Reviewed by Harry {doc} Babad © 2007

Synium Software GmbH www.vendorwebsiteURL.com Released: 13 July 2007 Shareware: $10.00 USD Available in German, English, Japanese, French, Italian and Dutch. System Requirements: Mac OS X 10.4 or later; Universal binary Hard Drive Space 3.4 MB. Strengths: As fast and easy to use applications deinstaller.

Weaknesses: If there was a way to prevent uninstalling application you want to protect, I could not find it. Previous Reviews: links to previous macCompanion reviews on the same product. A demo that works for five backup-archives and deletions is part of the download. Then you have to purchase a license: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/21453/. Copyright Notice: Product and company names and logos in this review may be registered trademarks of their respective companies The software was tested on a 1 GHz dual processor PowerPC G4 Macintosh with 2 GB DDR SDRAM running under OS X 10.4.10 Disclaimer: When briefly reviewing share-freeware I will often use the developer’s product, functions and features descriptions. All other comments are strictly my own and based on testing. Why need I rewrite the developer’s narratives, if they are clearly written?

Review Introduction

As a reviewer, I need to rid my computer of the stuff I don't want to use; and after a few months the rest of the items I'd thought to use but haven’t. My usual clue to what has to go is taking a scroll in my application and utilities folders, and seeing what Item I no longer recognize. It’s a little like the gifts we give our kids for their birthdays and holidays. A few become favorites the rest end up in the back of the closet. Check out the last used dates in the image below.

Sometimes I only barely recognize the application but remember it’s important. On such instances I assign it a flag – tagging it as a rarely used application. For those select tools, the space they occupy is less of a concern then having to reinstall the application when I again need it.

Items that fall into that category include Cocktail (a systems utility, Disable Tiger Features, Extensis Portfolio (a graphics cataloging tool), Mindjet’s MindManager (mind mapping) and Tweak Freak (a System’s Utility.)

For removing unneeded clutter, an application de-installer is the route to choose. [Check out the reasons why in my 3Rs column in this issue.] My requirements are KISS; to uninstall applications and its components, with a simple drag & drop; and an okay mouse click.

Prior to finding CleanApp, I alternated such cleanup tasks between AppZapper — Shareware $10, now version 1.8 (http://appzapper.com/) or the now unsupported uApp (both reviewed in macC March 2007). They flawlessly made unnecessary the need to track down where all an application’s pieces were squired away. Why two applications instead of one? … Because! I also use two browsers, two graphics programs.

Then along came CleanApp, which promised a more efficient interface for application deletion or in addition to archiving it. In addition it comes with a collection of tools that allow searching for things other than applications that often clutter up your driver. No I don’t mean you purple prose and puce pictures. CleanApp’s window will look familiar to users of AppZapper and uApp. However, the engine that runs the software is more sophisticated. The improvement claimed by its developer is a journaling feature that better keeps track of an application’s pieces.

Now I don’t know specifically what journaling features are or how they enhance removal of unwanted application pieces. But I figured journaling was a better cataloging system. I decided to take the plunge. Such an enhanced deletion feature was a plus. The software also the unique ability to archive an application and all its parts. [You did know passwords as well as use preferences are usually stored in the application’s .plst file. The application seemed sufficiently unique those I user, that my sense of curiosity won out. This despite the fact that I had two perfectly good applications (4.5/5.0 macCs) for trashing applications and their accompanying clutter.

Publisher’s (paraphrased) Summary

The usual application removal tool finds associated files and folders by using identifier-key, apparently defined by the application’s developer. All items associated with that key are offered up for deletion as part of a deinstallation process. According to the folks at Synium software, without such ID methods application associated files could not be identified for deletion. But using journaling makes things better!

CleanApp now offers a journaling-tool that makes it possible to track and remove all associated files for a selected program. The developers claim, that the journaling techniques are more thorough that simply deleting items identified by an applications {coded} signature keys. This, according to Synium the makes CleanApp a better solution for completely removing applications from your Mac OS X, or for archiving it for later use.

Getting Started

All it takes is the usual drop and drag, no special installer program needed or provided, double clicking on the application and adding you password — your good to go. If no password is entered you’ve five deletions with CleanApp before it dies. Then you’ll have to find another tool to delete it from your hard drive.

Trouble in Mine — Well, not quite! On my Macintosh what was installed was German Version of the software. This was true whether I downloaded the product from the developer’s web site or from Version Tracker or MacUpdate sites. Okay, I read German, but that would not help the rest of you who prefer English.

I tried to contact the developer, but had not received a reply when my publisher’s deadline crept up on me. It was time to turn to friends…

I asked Derek Caudill, a sometimes contributor to macC, to download the software and see what he’d see. English, said he! Derek suggested I check my Systems Preference > International (pane) to see what order I had arranged the languages. Needless to say dragging English to the top of my list solved the problem. I don’t know why none of my other application were so affected. Derek deserves some well-deserved thanks and I’m looking forward to reading his next article.

Back to the Deletion Game — Want to get rid of unused pesky apps once and for all? Use an uninstaller, one that lets you drag and drop programs to its interface. It lists al of the components the application installed and their location (path). I was appalled by the amount of stuff my favorite calendar, PandoCalendar, used and how widely stashed the pieces are. I have no idea why the CleanApp software included pieces of several Unsanity haxies. Were I to delete the application, I’d ignore them. The AppZapper screen did not show any extraneous finds.

CleanApp – PandoCalendar

AppZapper - PandoCalendar

You can leave all the pieces check, marked for deletion, or save an item or two. This allows you, on the rare occasions when it makes sense, to only delete a part of what the application has installed. I use such selectivity to delete preferences files when an application, occasionally acts up.

CleanApp offers some useful access extras across its toolbar so you can zero-in on the specific types of items you want to uninstall. Its Applications button displays all of installed apps and lets you know when they were last used. Try, you’d be surprised. A System Accessories button lets you sift through files like widgets, plug-ins and screensavers.

Under the More Features button you can quickly find and remove unused files, language packages, and old cache files. One of my favorite tools, under the More Features Tool, is a way to chase unused files.

There a Good and A Bad Of This — I had 816 of such files but since most of these were document’s I’d not yet moved to a technical archive DVD. I did not have the patience to check all 816 of these for things to trash, all I wanted was the flavor if the thing.

There is also a feature that allows you to trash part of a Universal Binary application’s parts that you don’t use on a non-Intel Macintosh. [Not for me, readers that feature makes me makes me truly nervous.]

An excellent feature of CleanApp, which I’ve not seen before, is the ability to turn on a feature called Install Logging. This appears to be tied to journaling, but the information provided by the vendor does not say so. This background task records when you install new software, so you (and CleanApp) can be absolutely sure all associated files get trashed when you perform an uninstall.

Anyone searching for an easy way to get rid of unused Mac applications should check out this program.

Using the Software

To quote the ReadMe file - “Drag the application you want to archive or delete into the blue cross hair on the CleanApp window. If the circle turns green you can drop the application and CleanApp will search for program files automatically. After that, use the checkboxes to select the files you like to archive or delete. Pressing "Create Archive" will create an archive and saves them to your User-folder (e.g., Users > harry > Documents > CleanApp). To delete an application press Delete Files. To reverse an archiving process, double-click the archive or drag it to the green cross hair in order to restore them. You can use the toolbar item Archives to browse the created archives.

I tested the latest versions of both AppZapper and CleanApp, to evaluate them when setting up to “perform” five identical deletions. How many items did they find and what were the differences if any were notable. The “fully dead” applications on my hit list were:

• Discuss — The least used of my three disk label creation applications,
• ConceptDraw 7 Professional — A mind mapping tool I liked but never used
• Image Capture — A great screen capture utility I never used because I found its timed capture inconvenient.
• Transmit — An FTP tool I’ve never mastered
• Visual Thesaurus 3, a tool I loved at first sight but never ever used after initial installation. I prefer Ultralingua or Roget’s New Thesaurus II On the Internet.

Application	CleanApp 2.3.1	AppZapper 1.8
Discuss	Found the application only	Found Application and parts folder including clipart
ConceptDraw Pro	The application went into a do loop-Had to be force quit. CleanApp would not then restart properly. I had to restart my Macintosh, which required another forced quit of CleanApp, before I could again access this tool	Found not only the application and its related items but also my review notes folders. I unchecked those since I was not ready to toss their contents
Image Capture	Found the Application and also a preference file associated with Apple’s image capture abilities. I took the coward’s way out and only deleted the application.	Found the Application but no preference file.
Transmit	The application and all of its components were found	The application and all of its components were found
Visual Thesaurus	The application when into a do loop when I dropped the application folder into it. {See Concept Draw discussion.) When I open the application folder and just dragged the application icon to CleanApp it worked. All the pieces were found ready for deletion.	Dragging the application folder into AppZapper, he application and all of its components were found.

Test Results

In all instances the removed application was either deleted (if delete was chosen for CleanApp) or moved to the Apple trashcan. Although you cannot reverse the delete operation to put all components back where they belong, you could at least check your trash to see if something you needed got accidentally deleted.

First in all instances where an application existed in a folder, I attempted to delete the entire folder. This worked universally in AppZapper, but caused several lockups in CleanApp. However, trashing the application (nested in its folder) using CleanApp deleted both the application, the folder and all related parts.

Neither program finds alias files; but EasyFind does so with ease.

An Other World Point of View — Our friends from musing from mars tested version 2.2.2 of CleanApp and preferred it to AppZapper. (http://www.musingsfrommars.org/index.php?p=784&postcat=25) Some of the cons our muse identified are not relevant to the way I use uninstall tools. I’ve too many hot keys already and therefore not being able to assign one to AppZapper is a never no mind.

A Bit About CleanApp’s Features

By having its functionality geared to its tool bar, CleanApp make it a bit easier to find special installed files by category.

• Applications — creates a list of your applications
• A Dashboard Widget — Its serves the same purpose as the application. I did not test the widget.
• System Accessories — creates a list of all installed Preference Pane
• Unused Files — helps you to find old or big unimportant files in the system. The developer’s notes were not helpful in lettering me know whether the files in question were documents created by one of my applications, or the application related materials.
• Language Packages — Using the feature you can remove all installed language modules for a given application to free up disk space. Of course, at least for the English language localization, the English language modules are not shown.
• Cache Files — creates a list of cache-files and -folders. Cache files listed whose application are running cannot be deleted. (Sensible) Although there are other cache deleting tools, having one integrated into CleanApp is a useful feature. The bad news is that there or so many of these on my drive, I have no idea what to delete.
• Archive — Show a list of your previously created archives, feature I did not test. Note that archives, which exist in a compressed form, can be burned to a CD/DVD for further of disk storage. I did not the applications’ archive function being a form believer of the clean install principal.
• Delete Protection — If this feature existed, I could not find it. In other uninstallers like AppZapper, it is possible to protect applications against deletion, at least until you, as the administrator, allow it to happen.

Discomfort

Needs Better Finder-Like Item Selection Ability in List Views — I agree with an unnamed reviewer that In the software’s applications window, on my computer produced a very long list of applications, doesn't respond to my typing in the initial keyboard letters of the applications name. In a normal finder window, especially in list view, typing the initial letters will jump to the first file starting with those letters. This seems like an obvious feature to add to the CleanApp views, which appear as lists.

No Shift Click Selection Mode — In addition when working with the applications list there was no way to either directly delete an unwanted item and as importantly, to click-shift to capture a group of such items to delete. To delete an item from the application list I first had to search for dependent files and the delete the application, one at a time. I recommend a trash icon be added to the toolbar that automatically gathers up the application and dependent files and then simultaneously trashes them. For safeties sake the author could make this an option in the preferences pane.

They Call it a Numbers Game — Check out the sizes of the items “collected for disposal in NeoOffice. No I did not trash the application, I was just playing around. Nevertheless, I’m glad I don’t have to count on the sizes.

Conclusion

Keep your Mac clean! The sooner you use an tool such as CleanApp, the easier it'll be for you to keep your system free of unused applications and their accompanying chaff. CleanApp's user interface is straightforward and easy to use. Just drag and drop the program you no longer need onto the CleanApp window.

Drop an application into the delete window; X marks the spot. After a few seconds you will see a list of files and folders that have been created by that program. Now choose, whether to delete, or to archive the program including all it's associated files and folders. That's it! You can also selectively delete some of the installed items, if you’re trouble shooting that application.

I found a few places where the CleanApp could not handle deleting a application in a developer designated and installed applications folder (ConceptDraw Pro and Visual Thesaurus.) The problem became more of an issue when I could not restart the application after a forced quit.

Which tool, CleanApp or AppZapper should you spend $10 on? Try them both. It will take me about six months, if I chose to keep careful track, to determine which tool I like better. Hopefully an update will be provided that fixed the “App in a folder problem.” Meanwhile uApp goes and I still have two alternate deinstallers installed on my drive. I shall continue to work with CleanApp but at this time prefer AppZapper for my needs.