Crow

Crow is a small Windows command-line tool that frees disk space. It finds build output (bin, obj, node_modules, target, ...) across all your projects, plus system junk like temp files and browser caches. You review the list, then Crow deletes what you picked. That leaves more space for your video games.

• Single ~4 MB exe. No .NET runtime needed.
• Shows sizes first and asks before deleting anything.
• Never follows junctions or symlinks out of the folder being cleaned.

Install

Run this in PowerShell:

irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Pienteger/Crow/master/install.ps1 | iex

It downloads the latest release for your CPU (x64 or ARM64) and checks its SHA-256. Then it copies crow.exe to C:\Users\Public\Pienteger and adds that folder to your user PATH. No admin rights or execution policy change needed.

Run the same command again to update.

Manual install

1. Download Crow-win-x64.zip (or Crow-win-arm64.zip for ARM devices) from the release page.
2. Unzip it.
3. Right-click setup.ps1 and choose Run with PowerShell. If Windows blocks the script, run Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser first.
4. Reopen your terminal and run crow help.

You can also skip the script: put crow.exe in any folder on your PATH.

Uninstall

Remove-Item C:\Users\Public\Pienteger -Recurse
$path = [Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable('Path', 'User') -split ';' | Where-Object { $_.TrimEnd('\') -ne 'C:\Users\Public\Pienteger' }
[Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable('Path', ($path -join ';'), 'User')

Quick start

crow clean --dry-run                # See how much system junk you have, delete nothing
crow clean                          # Pick what to clean from a checklist
crow dev --in C:\Users\you\source   # Find build output in all your projects

Commands

crow clean: system junk

Scans these locations and sorts them by size:

Selected by default	Opt-in
User and Windows temp files, crash dumps, Windows error reports, DirectX shader cache	Windows Update downloads
Internet cache, Chrome, Edge, Brave and Firefox caches	NVIDIA shader cache
VS Code, Discord, Slack and Teams caches	npm, Yarn, pip, NuGet and Gradle caches

You pick what to clean from a checklist. The safe locations are already ticked.

Flag	What it does
--dry-run	Only report what could be freed.
--all	Tick every location, not only the safe ones.
--older-than <hours>	Only remove files untouched for that long. Temp folders keep the last 24 hours by default.
--force	Clean the default selection without asking.

Only the contents of each location are removed, never the folder itself. Files in use are skipped. The Recycle Bin is not touched.

Tips:

• Close your browsers first, or their caches stay locked.
• Run from an elevated shell to clean the Windows folders fully.

crow dev: build output

crow dev --in C:\Users\you\source
crow dev --in D:\work D:\oss --ig D:\work\legacy-app

Walks the tree once and looks for these project types:

Project	Found by	Removes
.NET	*.csproj, *.fsproj, *.vbproj	bin, obj
Node.js	package.json	node_modules, .next, .nuxt, .turbo, .parcel-cache, .svelte-kit, .angular
Rust	Cargo.toml	target
Maven	pom.xml	target
Gradle	build.gradle, build.gradle.kts	build, .gradle
Python	pyproject.toml, requirements.txt	__pycache__, .pytest_cache, .mypy_cache, .ruff_cache, .tox
Flutter	pubspec.yaml	build, .dart_tool
CMake	CMakeLists.txt	cmake-build-debug, cmake-build-release

A folder is only reported when it sits next to its project file. A build folder with no Gradle or Flutter project next to it is left alone. Nested projects in a monorepo are found too.

Flag	What it does
--in <dir> ...	Folders to scan. Required.
--ig <dir> ...	Folders to skip.
--force	Delete without asking.

Custom scan

For anything the presets don't cover:

crow --lf *.csproj --in C:\Users\you\source\repos --rm bin obj
crow --lf package.json --in C:\Users\you\jsWorks --rm node_modules --ig C:\Users\you\jsWorks\keep-me

Flag	What it does
--lf <pattern>	Marker file that identifies a project folder. Required.
--in <dir> ...	Folders to scan. Required.
--rm <pattern> ...	Files or folders to delete next to the marker. Required.
--ig <path> ...	Paths to skip.
--force	Delete without asking.

Other

Command	What it does
crow help	Show usage.
crow version	Show the installed version.

Notes

• --lf and --rm take wildcards: * and ?.
• --in and --ig take full paths. A relative path is resolved against the current folder.
• Flags are case-insensitive.
• --force skips the confirmation prompt. Use it with care.

Build from source

Needs the .NET 10 SDK. From src:

dotnet test
dotnet run --project Crow -- help

To build the same native exe as the release (needs the Visual Studio C++ build tools):

dotnet publish Crow/Crow.csproj -c Release -r win-x64 -p:PublishAot=true -p:OptimizationPreference=Size -p:StripSymbols=true -o ../publish

Releasing

The Release workflow runs the tests and builds Native AOT exes for win-x64 and win-arm64. Then it smoke-tests them and publishes the zips with SHA-256 checksums.

git tag v1.2.0
git push origin v1.2.0

Or open Actions > Release > Run workflow and enter a version. The workflow creates the tag for you. A version with a suffix, such as 1.3.0-beta.1, is published as a pre-release.

License

MIT