disky

Fast macOS disk analyzer and cleanup CLI in Rust. Scan 2M files in seconds, Trash-restorable cleanup, agent-native JSON. Alternative to ncdu, dust, du, GrandPerspective, DaisyDisk — but built for the terminal AND for AI agents that shell out.

Why disky?

	disky	ncdu	dust	du	GrandPerspective
Scan speed (2M files)	~3 min	~8 min	~2 min	~5 min	~6 min
Stores snapshots	✅ DuckDB	❌	❌	❌	✅ proprietary
Diff between scans	✅ `disky diff`	❌	❌	❌	❌
TUI explorer	✅ ratatui	✅	✅	❌	n/a (GUI)
Cleanup wizard	✅ + Trash	❌	❌	❌	manual
APFS sparse-file aware	✅ `--physical`	❌	❌	❌	✅
JSON output for agents	✅ everywhere	❌	❌	❌	❌
Stable exit codes / RFC 9457 errors	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
macOS native	✅ (Apple Silicon)	✅	✅	✅	✅

disky is the only one that treats the AI agent as a first-class consumer: every command emits structured JSON, RFC 9457 problem details on stderr, stable exit codes, and a disky schema descriptor so an LLM can bind without prompt-engineering.

Install

From source (works today)

cargo install --git https://github.com/biliboss/disky

Pre-built binary

Download from Releases — aarch64-apple-darwin and x86_64-apple-darwin tarballs.

crates.io (coming soon)

cargo install disky

Homebrew (coming soon)

brew install biliboss/tap/disky

Quick start

disky scan /                       # scan from root (~3 min for 2M files)
disky                              # open ncdu-style TUI

disky top --physical               # largest files (physical bytes — APFS-aware)
disky dirs --physical              # largest directories
disky ext                          # usage by extension
disky find "*.log"                 # find by glob
disky stats --physical             # totals
disky list                         # snapshot IDs + sizes

disky cleanup --snapshot @latest                # dry-run preview
disky cleanup --target node_modules --apply --reversible   # → ~/.Trash

Snapshot diff & growth

disky scan /                       # before
# … time passes …
disky scan /                       # after
disky diff @latest~1 @latest       # what grew, shrank, was added or removed
disky growth --over-n 5            # OLS fit across 5 most-recent snapshots

Agent-native output

Every query command honours --format:

Flag	Behaviour
`--format text` (default on TTY)	Fixed-width ASCII tables
`--format json` (default when piped)	Envelope `{schema_version, kind, records}`
`--format ndjson`	One record per line — `jq -c` friendly

Errors land on stderr as RFC 9457 problem details with stable type URIs. Exit codes: 0 ok · 1 generic · 2 usage · 3 io · 4 not-found · 5 partial-scan · 6 lock-held.

Composing commands

Chain disky commands through disky filter — predicate DSL, no re-scan:

disky top --format json | disky filter --where "size > 1GB AND ext = 'log'"
disky growth --format json | disky filter --where "delta_bytes > 100MB"

How it's fast

jwalk parallel traversal — all CPU cores
getattrlistbulk macOS syscall — batch metadata, not one syscall per file
memchr SIMD — zero-alloc extension extraction
DuckDB Appender — 50k-entry batch inserts, columnar storage
Release profile — LTO thin, codegen-units=1, panic=abort

Benchmarks on a 500 GB SSD with 6.8M files: scan ~3 min · top-50 query <100 ms · TUI startup <2 s.

TUI keybindings

Key	Action
`↑↓` / `jk`	Navigate
`Enter` / `→`	Expand directory
`←` / `h`	Collapse / go up
`o`	Open in Finder
`c`	Copy path to clipboard
`e`	Export HTML report
`q` / `Esc`	Quit

FAQ

Why is logical size 100× bigger than physical?

APFS sparse files (e.g. OrbStack data.img.raw) report 8 TB logical but 13 GB physical. Use --physical on top, dirs, stats, ext to get the real on-disk footprint — that's what du measures. The default logical sum is useful when you want to know what applications think the file is.

How does cleanup avoid destroying my work?

Default is dry-run — you see exactly what would be removed before anything happens. Pass --apply to act, and --reversible to send files to ~/.Trash instead of rm -rf. The guided /disky Claude Code skill confirms every target via AskUserQuestion before applying.

Is there an MCP server?

Not anymore. disky-mcp was dropped in v0.10.0 — the CLI is the only surface. Every consumer (Claude Code, Cursor, agents) shells out and reads the JSON envelope. Less duplication, one contract. Resurrection path is documented in the v0.10.0 CHANGELOG entry if a non-shelling host actually shows up.

How does disky compare to `dust`?

dust is faster at raw traversal because it doesn't persist anything. disky trades ~30% scan time for a DuckDB snapshot you can diff, query with SQL, and re-run cleanup against without re-scanning. If you scan once and forget, dust wins. If you want to track disk usage over weeks or feed an agent, disky wins.

Does it work on Linux?

Not yet — disky leans on getattrlistbulk and APFS-specific physical-size plumbing. PRs welcome for a Linux backend.

Snapshots

disky list                                # show all snapshots
disky tui --snapshot 2026-05-15_11-56     # open by ID
disky tui --snapshot /path/to/snap.db     # arbitrary path
disky forget --keep-last 7 --apply        # restic-style retention

Snapshots live in ~/Library/Application Support/disky/YYYY-MM-DD_HH-MM.db.

Requirements

macOS 12+ (Apple Silicon or Intel)
Rust 1.75+ (to build from source)

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md. Quick loop: cargo fmt && cargo clippy -- -D warnings && cargo test.

License

Dual-licensed under either of MIT or Apache-2.0, at your option.

disky 0.11.0