How to: Save disc space, delete unnecessary languages in OS X
Whether you’re out of hard drive space or just want to tidy up, here’s a quick, easy and free way to deep six files lurking inside Apple’s Panther, Tiger, Leopard and even Snow Leopard operating systems. Pour yourself a fresh cup — caffeine is the secret sauce in any Mac maintenance job — and let’s get to work.
Monolingual, an open source application, performs one task and does admirably — remove unnecessary language resources from Mac OS X. Moreover, it works with Mac OS X 10.3, 10.4**, 10.5 and 10.6 — the last four major releases of Apple’s operating system opus.
1. Download Monolingual 1.4.1 here (1.2MB, **requires OS X 10.5.x or higher) and drag it to your Applications folder2. Start Monolingual, tick the boxes of the languages you want to go away
— Every language is listed, so don’t tick the one(s) you use (i.e. English)3. Click remove, type in your system password and sit back
4. Repeat for steps 2 & 3 for the Input Methods tab
** Panther and Tiger users, download Monolingual 1.3.9 (click to view “All Files,” thanks Jim Snodgrass for the heads up)
Performing the above steps removed 1.5GB of language localizations and 10MB of files from Input Menus — that’s pretty significant. Also, if you find you want to use one or more of those languages at a later date, it’s quite easy to re-install them from the install discs that came with your Mac or your retail copy of OS X.
What about architectures?
Because I’m running OS X 10.6.1 Snow Leopard and use Rosetta (PPC emulation) to run a number of older applications (i.e. Photoshop CS2) and have an ARM powered iPod touch, I wasn’t sure what if any PPC and ARM Architectures I could safely remove.
If any of you have solid knowledge on this subject, drop us and note with a link verifying your information in the comments below.
Have a favorite OS X utility? Share it with us all…
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