Ubuntu

Can "Clean Sweep" be trusted?

Asked by coljohnhannibalsmith

Being new to Ubuntu I downloaded a lot of things in Synaptic Package Manager I may not have needed in order to get certain applications to work. I may have downloaded some things I don't really need; so I installed "Clean Sweep," or is it "Klean Sweep." Anyway, when I run it and select "Orphaned Files" it lists about 1100 files. This seems like a lot and I don't want to delete anything that belongs to an application or System Process I need.

Can someone who's familiar with this application give me a head's up on what I can expect from it and how to attempt to verify that it's doing it's job correctly?

Thanks, John

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Jim Hutchinson (jphutch) said : 		#1

I don't about Kleansweep but the package manager is pretty good about taking care of itself. There are options for both apt-get and aptitude that will remove packages that are no longer used. As far as I know this is generally safe. However, be sure what it offers to remove actually makes sense. I don't recall the aptitude option but for apt-get try

sudo apt-get autoremove

It will tell you what it wants to remove and you can elect to continue or not.

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coljohnhannibalsmith (john-wakefield2) said : 		#2

Thanks Jim,

I tried:

sudo apt-get autoremove

and it removed some things. I've also got a couple of packages in the Synaptic Package Manager that I can't get rid of, which are:

linux-backport-modules-2.62
linux-ubuntu-modules-2.6.22-1

These are in:

Not Installed (residual config)

Do you no how to force removal of these? I'd also like to hear from someone who's used "Klean Sweep." I'm GNU to Ubuntu and I'm not really sure what to remove.

Thanks, John

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Jim Hutchinson (jphutch) said : 		#3

I'm not sure about the modules. I wouldn't mess with them though. If autoremove didn't remove them, that suggests they are being used by something. There is also

sudo apt-get autoclean

Which removes files downloaded and cached but no longer being used. That might clean out the unused modules but I'm not sure. I've never worried about it. In general, there is no need to remove things beyond using autoremove. Linux isn't like windows. The package manager keeps track of what is needed and not needed. Removing things is a good way to bork you system. There really isn't much maintenance that needs to be done like in windows. You don't defrag, anti-malware apps aren't necessary, you don't need to run periodic scans and so on. Just install, configure it how you want and enjoy.

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