PowerClean

A modern Windows 11 WPF app that combines the best of CCleaner (safe cleanup) and WinDirStat (visual disk analysis) — with extras like a registry cleaner, autostart manager, services and process monitor, and system maintenance one-clicks.

Features

Safe cleanup (CCleaner-style)

4-level safety classification (Safe · Recommended · Caution · Warning). Recycle Bin is default — every action is reversible unless you opt-in to permanent delete. Each cleanup entry is expandable so you can see every file path it will touch before you click clean.

• Windows temp folders (user & system)
• Thumbnail & icon caches
• Windows update cache (SoftwareDistribution\Download)
• Delivery-Optimization cache (P2P update cache)
• Logs, prefetch, memory dumps
• Recycle Bin (via Shell API)
• Browser caches: Chrome, Edge, Brave, Firefox — only cache folders, never bookmarks/cookies/history

Developer cleaner (for the %LOCALAPPDATA%\JetBrains-bloat crowd)

• JetBrains IDEs (Rider, IntelliJ, PyCharm, WebStorm, GoLand, PhpStorm, CLion, DataGrip): caches, logs, indexes & local history — config preserved
• Visual Studio: ComponentModelCache, ServiceHub logs
• NuGet: HTTP cache and aged global packages
• npm / pnpm / yarn caches
• bin/obj folders in your .NET projects (only in real project trees)
• node_modules folders in your workspaces
• Docker: docker system prune (never --volumes, so no data loss)

Disk analyzer (WinDirStat-style)

• Squarified treemap as a custom WPF control — proportional rectangles per file/folder
• Live update during scan — see results growing as the scan runs
• Parallel scan engine (multi-core, skips junctions/symlinks)
• Drill-down via tile double-click or tree-view
• Right-click context menu on every tile and tree node: Open in Explorer, Open with default app, Open in terminal, Copy path, Windows properties dialog, Delete

Autostart manager (more than Task Manager)

All Windows autostart sources in one place:

• HKLM/HKCU \Run and \RunOnce (+ Wow6432Node variants)
• User and Common startup folders
• Scheduled Tasks with logon/boot triggers (Microsoft tasks filtered out)
• Auto-start services
• Enable/disable via the same StartupApproved registry mechanism Windows uses

Installed programs

• Reads from registry (HKLM + HKCU + Wow6432Node)
• Size, version, publisher, install date
• Sort by size to find space hogs, by date to find old leftovers
• Direct uninstall (uses QuietUninstallString if available)
• Right-click: open install folder (with multi-source fallback), search web, jump to registry key

Services & recommendations

• All Windows services with RAM usage (WMI-resolved)
• Heuristic recommendations for typically deactivatable services (Fax, RemoteRegistry, DiagTrack, MapsBroker, WSearch, Print Spooler if no printer, Xbox, WerSvc, TabletInputService)
• Start / Stop / Set startup type (Auto / Manual / Disabled) — requires admin
• Direct jump to services.msc

Process monitor

• Top processes by RAM / CPU / threads / handles
• Updates every 2 seconds (toggleable)
• Per-process: open file location, properties, search web, kill process

Registry cleaner

• 7 categories scanned in parallel:
  • App Paths pointing to deleted exes
  • Dead autostart entries
  • Dead uninstaller entries
  • Obsolete MUI cache
  • OpenWith entries for deleted apps
  • SharedDLL references
  • File-extension ProgIDs that don't exist
• Every clean operation creates a .reg backup in %LOCALAPPDATA%\PowerClean\RegistryBackups\ — restore by double-click

System maintenance (one-click)

• Hibernation toggle (often saves several GB)
• Pagefile info + jump to Windows settings
• Restore points: list, delete oldest, delete all
• DISM component cleanup (often 5–10 GB)
• DISM /ResetBase (permanent, irreversible)
• DNS cache flush
• Print queue clear
• Recycle Bin force-empty

Other

• Background task overview: status strip at the bottom shows running scans/cleans; click for a popup with progress and cancel button
• Split-button for cleanup actions: explicit choice between recycle bin and permanent delete every time
• Localization: German and English, with live switch in Settings (defaults to your Windows UI language)
• Native Win11 look: WPF-UI Fluent design, Mica backdrop, your Windows accent color picked up from the registry
• Auto-update: checks GitHub releases on startup, prompts to install (via Velopack)

Tech stack

Area	Technology
Framework	.NET 9 (net9.0-windows10.0.19041.0) + WPF
UI library	WPF-UI (Fluent / Mica)
MVVM	CommunityToolkit.Mvvm
DI / Hosting	Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting
Installer/updater	Velopack
Architecture	Cleaner.Core (logic) + Cleaner.App (UI)

Install

Grab the latest installer from Releases:

PowerClean-Setup.exe

Double-click to install. The app installs to %LOCALAPPDATA%\PowerClean (no admin needed) and self-updates from GitHub on subsequent runs.

Build from source

Prerequisite: .NET 9 SDK.

git clone https://github.com/fgilde/PowerClean.git
cd PowerClean
dotnet build
dotnet run --project src/Cleaner.App

The output binary is PowerClean.exe under src/Cleaner.App/bin/Debug/net9.0-windows10.0.19041.0/.

Self-contained publish

dotnet publish src/Cleaner.App -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained `
  -p:PublishSingleFile=true -p:Version=0.1.0

Packing a Velopack installer (locally)

dotnet tool install --global vpk
dotnet publish src/Cleaner.App -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained -o publish
vpk pack --packId PowerClean --packVersion 0.1.0 `
         --packDir publish --mainExe PowerClean.exe `
         --outputDir releases

This produces releases\PowerClean-Setup.exe plus delta packages.

Project structure

PowerClean/
├── src/
│   ├── Cleaner.Core/                        # Headless logic (no UI refs)
│   │   ├── Models/                          # SafetyLevel, ScanResult, FileSystemNode, ...
│   │   ├── Cleaners/
│   │   │   ├── Windows/                     # 10× system cleaners
│   │   │   ├── Browsers/                    # Chrome, Edge, Brave, Firefox
│   │   │   └── Developer/                   # JetBrains, VS, NuGet, npm, Docker, ...
│   │   └── Services/
│   │       ├── DiskScanner.cs               # Parallel recursive scan
│   │       ├── DuplicateFinder.cs           # SHA-256 + size pre-filter
│   │       ├── RegistryScanner.cs           # 7-category scan with .reg backup
│   │       ├── AutostartScanner.cs          # Registry + scheduled tasks + services
│   │       ├── InstalledProgramsScanner.cs
│   │       ├── ServiceScanner.cs            # WMI-resolved RAM per service
│   │       ├── ProcessMonitorService.cs
│   │       ├── SystemMaintenanceService.cs  # DISM, hibernation, restore points, ...
│   │       └── FileSystemOperations.cs      # SHFileOperation for recycle bin
│   └── Cleaner.App/                         # WPF frontend
│       ├── App.xaml(.cs) / Program.cs       # Velopack entry, DI host
│       ├── MainWindow.xaml(.cs)             # FluentWindow + NavigationView + tasks strip
│       ├── Localization/                    # DE + EN dictionary, live-switching markup ext
│       ├── Views/Pages/                     # 12 pages
│       ├── ViewModels/Pages/                # Per-page VMs
│       ├── Controls/
│       │   ├── TreemapControl.cs            # Custom squarified treemap
│       │   ├── CleanerPanelView.xaml(.cs)
│       │   └── RunningTasksPanel.xaml(.cs)
│       ├── Services/
│       │   ├── RunningTaskRegistry.cs       # Background task overview
│       │   └── UpdateService.cs             # Velopack GitHub update check
│       ├── Helpers/
│       │   ├── PathOpener.cs                # Shell verb wrapper
│       │   └── WindowsUserHelper.cs         # GetUserNameEx
│       └── Converters/                      # Bytes→Size, SafetyLevel→Brush, ...
└── .github/workflows/release.yml            # Build + Velopack pack + GitHub release

Safety

PowerClean is safe-by-default:

• 4-step safety classification per cleaner with color badges
• Only Safe and Recommended pre-selected
• Recycle Bin is default; split-button lets you pick permanent delete per action
• Browser cleaners only touch Cache, Code Cache, GPUCache, Service Worker — never bookmarks/cookies/history
• Confirmation dialog before every clean
• Docker system prune never includes --volumes
• Junctions/symlinks skipped during disk scan (no double-counting, no loops)
• Registry cleaner always creates a restorable .reg backup before deleting
• NuGet global-packages: only entries older than 180 days suggested
• Temp folders: files younger than 1 hour are skipped (might be in use)

Releases

Tagging a commit v0.2.0 (etc.) triggers the GitHub Action that builds, packs with Velopack, and publishes:

• PowerClean-Setup.exe (full installer)
• *-delta.nupkg (incremental update packages)
• RELEASES index file

Installed clients auto-update from these on next launch.

Contributing

Issues and PRs welcome — especially new cleaners. To add one:

1. Extend CleanupTargetBase in Cleaner.Core/Cleaners/
2. Override Id, Name, Description, Category, SafetyLevel, EnumerateCleanupRoots()
3. Register it in Cleaner.App/Helpers/ServiceCollectionExtensions.cs

Done — it shows up in the matching page automatically.

License

MIT