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Warning! Do not remove languages in OS X Mavericks.

justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
Just to warn people!

Do NOT remove languages in Mavericks, I did this on most of the former OS X versions without any problems but it seems Mavericks is different.

I removed all non English Languages in Apps and the whole system before but this time many Applications just crash upon opening or do not work properly, example, Terminal opened but crashed instantly, after copying the App from a backup it worked again, Mail opens but it won't display any content from any mail you get, I again copied from a clean System and it works again.

This never happened on Systems from 10.0 b to 10.5.8 and Mountain Lion, I skipped Snow Leopard and Lion so I can't say if this was also the case for those OS X versions.

So, especially for people who use Apps that remove languages, be careful, it might damage your system.
 
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benwiggy

macrumors 68020
Jun 15, 2012
2,382
201
The disk footprint of Mavx is tiny -- less than 10Gb. There's really no need for deleting resource files, even if you can't speak Portuguese or whatever. There have always been some problems with apps that strip resources on previous versions, depending on what you run and what you select for deletion.
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
benwiggy said:
The disk footprint of Mavx is tiny -- less than 10Gb. There's really no need for deleting resource files, even if you can't speak Portuguese or whatever. There have always been some problems with apps that strip resources on previous versions, depending on what you run and what you select for deletion.
Click to expand...

As I said above, until now I never ran into any of the problems you mention, all apps and the system kept on working, not this time.
I know it isn't that much but it is more than you think, there are also help folders in all of Apple's Apps and each and every language has it's own help files.
It's just junk I don't need, and there is plenty of stuff I also delete like the Dictionary files and screen savers, never use them, and neither do I need any other language than English.

Zmijutin said:
I've deleted all languages except for English. And everything works just fine.
Click to expand...

That's odd, I might have deleted something more than I think I did.
I use EasyFind (App), then search for .lproj folders, then select all the non English ones and delete them, and yes, I keep the en.lproj-el.lproj amongst others like Australian and UK english.

Edit: I also deleted all languages except English from the whole disk so also the System-usr-private and others.
 
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M

madmacfan

macrumors 6502
Feb 19, 2012
282
2
London, United Kingdom
justperry said:
Just to warn people!

Do NOT remove languages in Mavericks, I did this on most of the former OS X versions without any problems but it seems Mavericks is different.

I removed all non English Languages in Apps and the whole system before but this time many Applications just crash upon opening or do not work properly, example, Terminal opened but crashed instantly, after copying the App from a backup it worked again, Mail opens but it won't display any content from any mail you get, I again copied from a clean System and it works again.

This never happened on Systems from 10.0 b to 10.5.8 and Mountain Lion, I skipped Snow Leopard and Lion so I can't say if this was also the case for those OS X versions.

So, especially for people who use Apps that remove languages, be careful, it might damage your system.
Click to expand...

Strange. I ran Monolingual on the first day I installed Mavericks GM and i've not had any issues at all after removing all languages other than english. Mail and all my other Apps are still working fine. Which method have you used to remove the unwanted languages from your system. I'd advise not to attempt to remove them manually and use an app such as monolingual.
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
madmacfan said:
Strange. I ran Monolingual on the first day I installed Mavericks GM and i've not had any issues at all after removing all languages other than english. Mail and all my other Apps are still working fine. Which method have you used to remove the unwanted languages from your system. I'd advise not to attempt to remove them manually and use an app such as monolingual.
Click to expand...

I am a poweruser, I do know the system well, you could look into my history and see I helped out quite a few people, so I guess I know what I do, I also always keep a backup so if I mess up I can easily correct the problem.
Another thing I could do is to run the installer again to get rid of the problem.
I said above I use Easyfind to find the folders named .lproj, the App you use only removes languages from the Application folder, not from the System itself for instance, I guess something got damaged there although I find that fairly hard to believe, reason, when I copy over a damaged App, like Terminal for instance it starts to work again.
Later on I will run Mavericks installer again and then try to remove the languages again, first only on the Application folder and if it still all works on the System folders.
 
B

benwiggy

macrumors 68020
Jun 15, 2012
2,382
201
justperry said:
It's just junk I don't need
Click to expand...
There are millions of files in OS X. The average user probably needs considerably less than half of them in their essential cat video watching and forum posting. ;)

Have you removed Ruby? Python? X11? System extensions for hardware you don't have? Garageband samples?

You say you've never had problems until now -- but you've deleted something you needed now, and others seem not to. With previous OS versions, you didn't delete stuff you needed, but other people have.
The data is small. I would be surprised if it's 1Gb. Maybe a little more if you throw in loads of third-party apps. Of course, it's up to you, if you really want to.

You're warning people not to do this. So am I, but for different reasons. :D
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
benwiggy said:
There are millions of files in OS X. The average user probably needs considerably less than half of them in their essential cat video watching and forum posting. ;)

Have you removed Ruby? Python? X11? System extensions for hardware you don't have? Garageband samples?

You say you've never had problems until now -- but you've deleted something you needed now, and others seem not to. With previous OS versions, you didn't delete stuff you needed, but other people have.
The data is small. I would be surprised if it's 1Gb. Maybe a little more if you throw in loads of third-party apps. Of course, it's up to you, if you really want to.

You're warning people not to do this. So am I, but for different reasons. :D
Click to expand...

I warn People because most of them just don't know what they do, for instance they use a crap App like CleanMyMac-Mackeeper and the like which they should never use, I know what I do, if I mess up, and it rarely happens I still have a backup or run the installer again.

I probably by accident deleted a few .lproj folders which were needed, for instance, I know I deleted just a few en or el.lproj folders in the System, this might be the problem.
I say it is junk for me because I don't need those languages/help folders, now, I prefer to get rid of them and believe me it is more than 1 GB, quite a bit more, especially if all those Apps contain help folders in each Language and they are there in most if not all Apple Apps.

I have plenty of time to get rid of this, I also find it kind of a sport to see if all goes well, this time it didn't, but it is easily solved.
Others with less knowledge of the System might not be so lucky and they end up spending lost of time to reinstall OS X, that's why I gave the warning. :)
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
jhfenton said:
I take it as a challenge and reminder of how many languages I don't know.
Click to expand...

Well, lets see, switch to an unknown language and then try to find your way.
I got this just a while ago on a windows PC, switched to Thai, logged in and out again and then I was lost, the girl I had to do that for wasn't much of a help to switch it back, the language to switch to should automatically be in the language you change to, example, if I want to switch back to English it should say English next to the Thai word for it, but hey, this was Windows, don't expect them to be that smart.:D
 
MrGimper

MrGimper

macrumors G3
Sep 22, 2012
8,475
11,746
Andover, UK
jhfenton said:
I take it as a challenge and reminder of how many languages I don't know.
Click to expand...

I used monolingual to remove all but English, English UK and English US, and have no problems at all.

----------
justperry said:
I warn People because most of them just don't know what they do, for instance they use a crap App like CleanMyMac-Mackeeper and the like which they should never use, I know what I do, if I mess up, and it rarely happens I still have a backup or run the installer again.

I probably by accident deleted a few .lproj folders which were needed, for instance, I know I deleted just a few en or el.lproj folders in the System, this might be the problem.
I say it is junk for me because I don't need those languages/help folders, now, I prefer to get rid of them and believe me it is more than 1 GB, quite a bit more, especially if all those Apps contain help folders in each Language and they are there in most if not all Apple Apps.

I have plenty of time to get rid of this, I also find it kind of a sport to see if all goes well, this time it didn't, but it is easily solved.
Others with less knowledge of the System might not be so lucky and they end up spending lost of time to reinstall OS X, that's why I gave the warning. :)
Click to expand...

Bit harsh calling CleanMyMac crap. I've been running it on 3 machines for years and it does it's job and has never caused a single issue.
 
CB1234

CB1234

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2012
784
491
Dubai, UAE
justperry said:
I warn People because most of them just don't know what they do, for instance they use a crap App like CleanMyMac-Mackeeper and the like which they should never use,
Click to expand...

I am a non techie - so bear with me if my questions are stupid.

You said people use crap APP like CleanMyMac, which they should never use…

I use it a lot, and thought it was helping me get rid a lot of useless files on the hard drive. From your comment it seems that it is not what it is doing… Can you tell me why not to use CleanMyMac and what is App actually doing when I use it.

Thanks for your advice.
 
B

benwiggy

macrumors 68020
Jun 15, 2012
2,382
201
CB1234 said:
Can you tell me why not to use CleanMyMac and what is App actually doing when I use it.
Click to expand...
Your Mac does not need "cleaning". It requires almost nothing in the way of "routine maintenance" that you need to perform regularly.
Apps like this do all sorts of things, from purging memory, emptying caches, to deleting files that may or may not have been left by deleted apps.

In short: they are unnecessary at best, and destructive at worst.
Wit the size of hard drives these days, even if there are some unneeded files on your disk, they will do no harm and take up little space.
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
CB1234 said:
I am a non techie - so bear with me if my questions are stupid.

You said people use crap APP like CleanMyMac, which they should never use…

I use it a lot, and thought it was helping me get rid a lot of useless files on the hard drive. From your comment it seems that it is not what it is doing… Can you tell me why not to use CleanMyMac and what is App actually doing when I use it.

Thanks for your advice.
Click to expand...

See the comment from benwiggy below your post, people have had massive problems with these kind of Apps, they are not needed, many times you'll see people coming from windows which think it is a good idea to use such Apps on a regular basis, OS X does not need to be cleaned, only if you get into problems you could use an App called OnyX, this one is the one to use, but again, only when there are problems and it is rare on OS X to get into problems, OS X also has it's own maintenance scripts which run on a daily/weekly and monthly basis, this is enough.
Don't use CleanMyMac, MacKeeper and CCleaner, they are potentially destructive for your System, if you don't believe me search for it on Mroogle, there are plenty of people which ran into problems using these Apps.

----------
MrGimper said:
I used monolingual to remove all but English, English UK and English US, and have no problems at all.

----------



Bit harsh calling CleanMyMac crap. I've been running it on 3 machines for years and it does it's job and has never caused a single issue.
Click to expand...

It is crap, as is MacKeeper and CCleaner, use Onyx if you run into problems, that one is much more reliable.
 
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CB1234

CB1234

macrumors 6502a
Sep 20, 2012
784
491
Dubai, UAE
Thanks guys for your advise.

I had changed over from windows few years ago, and it seems I have carried over some bad habits.... Although I was told that OSX didn't need cleaning, I thought 'surely it must'....

I will stop using it from now on.

Thanks once again for your advise..
 
M

mindlessmissy

macrumors newbie
Apr 13, 2012
29
0
The solution is Base.lproj ...

To the original thread starter ...

Us power users like to tinker with stuff (heck I still use the root account just because I hate typing in passwords) ....

That said, with Mavericks I find that there is a new lproj called Base.lproj that NEEDS to be left alone else the system messes up ...

So I am guessing with Base.lproj and whatever language one decides to keep still intact, every other non-needed language files can be deleted (to save some space) ...

Good thing is the Base.lproj files don't seem to occupy that much disk space themselves ... :)
 
justperry

justperry

macrumors G5
Original poster
Aug 10, 2007
12,558
9,750
I'm a rolling stone.
mindlessmissy said:
To the original thread starter ...

Us power users like to tinker with stuff (heck I still use the root account just because I hate typing in passwords) ....

That said, with Mavericks I find that there is a new lproj called Base.lproj that NEEDS to be left alone else the system messes up ...

So I am guessing with Base.lproj and whatever language one decides to keep still intact, every other non-needed language files can be deleted (to save some space) ...

Good thing is the Base.lproj files don't seem to occupy that much disk space themselves ... :)
Click to expand...

Yup, that was what I was thinking as well, but good you confirmed it, I left them mostly there, I did in the System and other OS related folders yet I removed them from some Apps in the Application folder.

Cheers mindlessmissy
 
GGJstudios

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
MrGimper said:
I used monolingual to remove all but English, English UK and English US, and have no problems at all.
Click to expand...
I've found Monolingual to be the safest app for removing unwanted languages and architectures. However, there have been reports in the past of problems arising from deleting certain non-English languages. I don't recall which languages they are (only 1 or 2) and I don't know if that's true for the most recent versions of OS X, but I'd probably just leave the languages.
MrGimper said:
Bit harsh calling CleanMyMac crap. I've been running it on 3 machines for years and it does it's job and has never caused a single issue.
Click to expand...
It's not harsh at all. It has a very questionable reputation in the Mac community. I would not recommend using CleanMyMac or any of its variants, based on the number of complaints that have been posted in this forum and elsewhere. As an example: CleanMyMac cleaned too much. Here's a recent example. While you may not have experienced problems yet, enough people have that it's wise to avoid it, especially since there are free alternatives that have better reputations, such as Onyx.
 
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BrooklynAl

macrumors regular
Jul 31, 2011
155
7
Next step the twilight zone

After reading several posts I felt I had entered an alternate reality.......I have Mavericks on two machines retaining only English and US English without....any issues.:confused:
 
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