OmniDiskSweeper for Mac

Used to be pretty good, but out of some reason the current version doesn't sort according to size at every level in macOS 13.6.5, so I'm deleting it for the first time. I don't see the point of using it considering the alternatives.

I had updated a few days ago to Sonoma 14.2 on my 14 inch MacBook Pro M3 and all of a sudden and I don't know if this was the reason for it or not it seemed like my Mac was choked with data. I was finding it only showed like 140 GB of data in Finder for my system, but if you backed up to users or the System Settings and totaled everything up, it was saying that I was using like a terabyte of data and I've only got a 512 machine with whatever it is 490 GB some available. I tried AppleCare. They seem to be clueless about the whole thing, trying to convince me that they were just estimates and don't pay any attention to what System Settings were saying, but that was preventing me from downloading some things and doing them because I'd be told I didn't have enough space. So fortunately I'm in a spot where I can take this laptop back until January 14 and I was certainly thinking about it the last couple of days as I kept watching videos and googling and using AI to try to give me suggestions as to what to do about this and then I ran across this OmniDiskSweeper that is provided here. From a quick review of the information it looked like everybody thought it was safe and it had good results with it so I thought what the heck. I was a little nervous down deleting certain files that were big, but I just kept doing it kind of slowly and gradually feeling into everything using the swag system and everything kept working and as it is now after working with this thing for a couple hours and it will not take me anywhere near that much time. In the future probably just a few minutes I've got my machine back cleaned up and it's showing I'm using about 94 GB of data out of the 490 available. So I'm terribly pleased!! Thank you, thank you thank you for developing this!!

I tied three other products before this one. The others were ok, but I find OmniDiskSweep the most helpful. It's all in the simplicity. My system has
one 256G SSD
one 512G SSD
one 4T HD
two 8T HD

In addition to macOS, I have two critical virtual servers running as guest OSs (Debian) under VMWARE Fusion. The primary files I use are distributed among the five drives, and they all are backed up to other drives. Every drive has some primary files, all the HDs have backups of files that are primary on other drives. It is not the most complicated thing in the world, but it is not the simplest either. OmniDiskSweep always is running on one of the macOS desktops. It really helps me see where disks are getting crowded and to keep my files organized.

There is one problem I am having, I don't know if it affects anyone else. OmniDiskSweep is not automatically updating as files move around. I have to close the window for a drive and start new sweeps. It used to update automatically, but that stopped happening somewhere along the way.

I do not use OmniDiskSweep for deleting anything. I tried once and there was no problem, but dango, it sure worked fast and there is no getting files back when deleted that way (except from backup).

OmniDiskSweeper is now at version 1.11. It now supports macOS 10.14 Mojave. It requires at least macOS 10.13 High Sierra. Older versions are available at the OmniGroup site. "Version 1.11 — Sunday, September 23, 2018 • Dark Mode — Added support for Mojave’s Dark Mode. • File Access Alerts — On Mojave, any app which attempts to access a folder which contains your calendars, contacts, photo library, or reminders will trigger an alert. When OmniDiskSweeper scans the files in your home folder, it triggers these alerts: so we’ve added a description that explains that OmniDiskSweeper doesn’t actually open any of the files it scans, it just lists those files for you to review. If you wish, you can avoid these prompts by granting OmniDiskSweeper full disk access under System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy. (Or you can proceed without granting OmniDiskSweeper permission to scan those folders, in which case OmniDiskSweeper won’t be able to tell you how large they are.)" Provided kindly for free, this is a reasonable, colorful, useful way to dig around on your drives to find what's taking up all your drive space and how much of it, starting with the invisible files and folders we normally don't see. Also note that the free OmniWeb browser is still around and kept up-to-date. I've been using their test versions for years and still prefer it for some purposes on the net. [Sad note: OmniDictionary, abandoned by OmniGroup years ago, has finally flown off to code heaven as of macOS 10.14. Mojave. It's an eternal bomber. I'll miss the good old thing.]

One main issue with OmniDiskSweeper is that it won't allow for deleting any files owned by root. That can be useful for protecting the user, but there should be a run as admin mode for when you need to clean up de-installaitons that left files behind. At least it'd be nice if the interface acknowledged the permissions didn't allow for deletion. There's not even an error sound. I know, free software and usually works great, but just some indication, please.