DevCleaner 1.6.0: Project Hibernation for Mac developers
Just shipped the biggest @DevCleaner update yet.
📦 Project Hibernation lets you archive projects you are not actively working on, off your disk into a single file, and restore them in one click whenever you need them. It handles dependency reinstall on restore, is iCloud aware, and verifies every archive before touching the original.
👻 Also added Ghost Projects (per project Xcode DerivedData breakdown) and Project Artifacts (stale node_modules and build folders ranked by age).
✨DevCleaner stays free for manual cleanup and scanning. The automation layer is now Pro, with a 14 day free trial. Lifetime licenses are capped for early supporters at 29 dollars.
Would love feedback from the dev community here. What would you want a tool like this to do next?
Download here
👉🏼 devcleaner.app 👈🏼
Replies
This could evolve into a full dev environment lifecycle manager, not just cleanup.
DevCleaner
The concept is compelling especially with AI assisted temporary than ever. The real selling point for me would be how reliable restores are after months of hibernation.
DevCleaner
@alan_gregory That's exactly the feature that lets you set how long you want your projects to go into hibernation when they're inactive. The easiest way is to download and activate the 14-day PRO tier trial and try everything out.
One question: have you considered adding support for Docker-based projects so developers can restore not only the codebase but also the exact runtime environment?
That would make long-term project recovery even more reliable.
DevCleaner
@prashant_patil14 Great suggestion, and it lines up really well with how Hibernation already thinks. Your Dockerfile and compose file are part of the codebase, so they get archived today. The interesting part is what they reference: built images (regenerable, like node_modules) and named volumes (your actual data, which nothing can rebuild).
The plan I am leaning toward: snapshot the named volumes into the archive since that is the irreplaceable bit, record the build or pull commands in the restore manifest, and on restore offer a one-click "docker compose build and up" the same way it offers npm install today. The new dry-run preview would show exactly which volumes and images come back before you commit.
One honest caveat: rebuilding from a Dockerfile is only as reproducible as the image tags it pins, so for a guaranteed offline restore there would be a "full" mode that exports the images too. Adding this to the roadmap. Thanks for pushing on long-term reliability, that is exactly the goal.
Project hibernation is a very practical idea. Developers accumulate local environments the same way teams accumulate unused SaaS tools: slowly, invisibly, and then suddenly it becomes a mess.
The restore confidence is the key part. If I archive a project, I need to trust that it can come back cleanly with dependencies, files, and context intact. The verification step before touching the original feels important because this is one of those workflows where one bad restore can make people stop trusting the feature entirely.
DevCleaner
@rahulbhavsar Thanks - this is exactly why I built hibernation the way I did. Archiving only removes your project after the zip/tar is built, integrity-checked, and (if configured) moved to your external drive or iCloud; any step fails and the folder stays put. On restore, we added Preview restore in 1.6.1 (eye icon in Archived Projects): it verifies the archive, shows the exact destination path, file count, and top-level contents - without downloading an iCloud-parked file or touching anything on disk. If something already lives at the original path, we restore alongside it as ProjectName (restored), never overwrite. Light archives keep source, git, and lockfiles and offer one-click pnpm install / pod install / etc. (plus Docker volume snapshots where applicable); full archives are meant to come back ready to open. Restore is free even without Pro - we'd rather you trust the round-trip than gate getting your code back.