filedust

filedust is a small, fast, and safe command-line tool that scans your filesystem for obvious junk — things like Python pycache folders, build artifacts, editor backup files, and leftover temporary files — and cleans them up.

Think of it as “autoremove for files.”

Features

Cleans common junk

Deletes well-known clutter such as:

• __pycache__/

• .pytest_cache, .mypy_cache, .ruff_cache

• build/, dist/

• editor backups *~, *.swp, *.tmp, etc.

• OS metadata like .DS_Store, Thumbs.db

Rich, colorful table output

It wasn't essential, but it's easy to read at a glance.

Single confirmation prompt

One interactive prompt at the end of the run (unless -y is used).

Reclaimed space summary

Shows how much disk space can be freed.

Safe by design

• It ONLY runs within user's $HOME

• Put user in control by reading ~/.filedust.conf

• Never touches dotfiles, configs, project files, or anything important unless you want.

Installation

From GuardUtils package repo

This is the preferred method of installation.

Debian/Ubuntu

1) Import the GPG key

sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/guardutils.gpg

The GPG fingerprint is 0032C71FA6A11EF9567D4434C5C06BD4603C28B1.

2) Add the APT source

echo "deb [arch=amd64 signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/guardutils.gpg] https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/debian stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/guardutils.list

3) Update and install

sudo apt update
sudo apt install filedust

Fedora/RHEL

1) Import the GPG key

sudo rpm --import https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg

2) Add the repository configuration

sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/guardutils.repo > /dev/null << 'EOF'
[guardutils]
name=GuardUtils Repository
baseurl=https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/rpm/$basearch
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
repo_gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg
EOF

4) Update and install

sudo dnf upgrade --refresh
sudo dnf install filedust

From PyPI

pip install filedust

From this repository

git clone https://github.com/guardutils/filedust.git
cd filedust/
poetry install

Custom config

You can download the example and add your custom rule

wget -O ~/.filedust.conf https://git.sysmd.uk/guardutils/filedust/raw/branch/main/.filedust.conf.example

TAB completion

Add this to your .bashrc

eval "$(register-python-argcomplete filedust)"

And then

source ~/.bashrc

pre-commit

This project uses pre-commit to run automatic formatting and security checks before each commit (Black, Bandit, and various safety checks).

To enable it:

poetry install
poetry run pre-commit install

This ensures consistent formatting, catches common issues early, and keeps the codebase clean.