Nepenthe

Selective forgetfulness for macOS Time Machine.

Nepenthe finds high-churn and regenerable directories — node_modules, .build, DerivedData, and more — and excludes them from Time Machine backups. The result: faster backups and less wasted storage.

Install

Homebrew

brew install ryanwersal/tools/nepenthe

From source

Requires mise for toolchain management.

git clone https://github.com/ryanwersal/nepenthe.git
cd nepenthe
mise install
mise run build
mise run install   # copies binary to /usr/local/bin

Quick start

Launch the interactive TUI:

nepenthe

Or scan from the command line:

nepenthe scan

Run nepenthe --help for the full command reference.

Scheduled scanning

Run scans automatically with Homebrew services:

brew services start nepenthe

This runs nepenthe scan --accept-consents every 24 hours. Logs are written to $(brew --prefix)/var/log/nepenthe/.

Development

mise install        # set up Go + tooling
mise run build      # build to dist/
mise run test       # run tests
mise run lint       # run golangci-lint
mise run clean      # remove dist/

License

GPL-3.0