darkmatter2048/windowscleaner

Windows Cleaner is a free utility for Windows 10 and 11 that focuses on cleaning up your C drive and resolving storage problems that accumulate over time. It is built and maintained by a single developer who goes by DaYe, and the README is primarily written in Chinese, reflecting its main audience. The project has a light and dark mode GUI, and is distributed as a standard installer. The tool is a desktop application built with Python and PyQt5, a library for creating graphical interfaces. The interface uses QFluentWidgets, a UI component library built on top of PyQt5 that gives the app a modern Windows-style look. The core logic lives in a file called clean.py, which the developer specifically notes as the protected intellectual heart of the project. To install it, you download a pre-built installer from the official website or from cloud storage links provided in the README, then run through a standard Next-click installation. If you want to build it from source yourself, you clone the repository, install Python 3.8, install dependencies from a requirements file, and run the main script. Compiling a standalone executable requires an additional tool called Nuitka, and building the installer requires Inno Setup. A GitHub Actions workflow handles automated builds. The project is licensed under GPL-3.0. The developer makes a point of noting that any software which substantially copies the cleaning algorithm logic would count as a derivative work under that license and must also be released as open source. Code signing is provided for free by SignPath.io, which means the installer passes Windows security checks without triggering unsigned software warnings. Donations are accepted, and a QQ group and Telegram group are available for community discussion.