DigitalVolcano

Duplicate Cleaner V1.2

FREEWARE April 2007

For Updates and more great software check www.digitalvolcano.co.uk

Requirements
Installation
Usage Search Location
Size Range
Scanning
Results
Image Preview
Selecting Duplicate Files for Further Action
Deleting, Moving, or Hard Linking Files
Importing/Exporting scan results

Update History V1.1 , V1.2

Requirements
Microsoft Windows 98,ME,2000,XP.  Windows 95 and Windows Vista installations are currently untested/unsupported.

Requires minimum 800x600 screen resolution.

For Windows 95, 98 and ME you will need the Unicode driver from Microsoft.
Download it here- Microsoft Unicode Driver

Installation
Double click on the DuplicateCleaner.exe file in Windows Explorer.  You will be guided through a simple automatic install process to the location of your choice.

Usage

You should only use duplicate cleaner if you understand your computer's file system, and you know what you are doing!
Always remember that data should be backed up regularly. We take no liability for any data lost or damaged through use or misuse of this software.  We recommend that important data is backed up prior to the use of this software, and deletion to the recycle bin is always selected. Also, you should always check that your recycle bin is enabled in Windows' own settings (right click-properties on bin).

Duplicate Cleaner looks for files on your hard disc that appear twice.  There may be a good reason for this - a program may require a file in a certain place to work.  If in doubt, do not delete a file!

 
Search Location - where to look. 

First we need to tell the program where to search. On the 'Search Criteria' tab you can choose folders by clicking on the folder icon, or type in the name yourself. Add the folder to the search list by clicking on the 'Add Search Path' button.  All paths in this list will then be included in the duplicate scan.  The program will also search all subfolders contained within the folders in the list as well. If you don't want this to happen, untick the 'Scan all subfolders' checkbox.

 There are two modes of operation - File Search and Music Search.

 File Search

This default mode will scan any file according to the filter criteria you specify. You can choose from one of the preset filters (graphics file, MS Office files, Movies, etc) by clicking on the 'Select' button,  or you can type in your own.  Multiple filters are separated by a semicolon (;).

You may specify to search for duplicates by any combination of:

• Same Content (CRC 32 checksum)
• Same File Name
• Same Size
• Same Date (Note - this is the file's Modified Date)

Same content (CRC) is the default option. When this option is ticked files will be classed as duplicates if they have identical content. This means they could have a different date, file name, etc.

Music Search

This special mode will seas music files and read the extra information contained within the file - Song title, Artist, Length, Bit Rate, etc. The currently supported formats are MP3, WMA,OGG,APE and FLAC.  This information can then be used as an additional tool when deciding which files to delete.

You may specify to search for duplicates by any combination of:.

• Same Artist
• Same Title
• Same Album

Some examples:

I want to find duplicates that are exactly the same

• Select 'Same Content' only

• Select 'Same name' only

I want to find if I have multiple copies of MP3 files

• Try Music Search with 'Same Artist' and 'Same Title' only checked.  You should also do a separate 'Same Content'  file search as well, to catch any duplicate files with missing tags.

Size Range 

In both modes you can specify and minimum and maximum file size in KB (Kilobytes).  If either is set to 0 then that value is ignored.

Scanning
Now you are ready to start the scan. Click on the 'Start' button to the bottom left to begin. This may take a while depending on the number of files in your folders and the size of the files. It may take longer to scan a networked drive than a local one.  A Percentage progress is displayed to the bottom left of the window.  Once the scan is complete a summary is displayed and any duplicate sets are show in the main window.  You can cancel the scan by clicking on the 'Cancel' button which appears in place of the 'Start' button once the scan is underway.  Note that this may take a short time to respond depending on the status of the scanning process.

Results
Results are displayed in the various tabs:

Duplicate files
The duplicate sets are listed here. They are divided into colour coded 'groups'.  Each item in a group is classed as 'the same' according your search criteria.
You can right-click on a file to get a context menu with additional actions for the selected file.

All Files Scanned
This is a list of all files included in the scan, with attribute information. Double click on a file to open/view it.

Zero Size Files
This is a list of files which have a size of 0, ie. No content. Technically, they are all duplicates.  They will be listed in the main duplicate files list if specified in the 
options.

Image Preview
You may view a preview image of a graphics file using the Image Preview window. Click on the View-->Image Preview Window menu to obtain the window. Click on an image file (JPG,BMP,ICO,GIF,WMF) in the results list to view it. You can zoom the image using the slider bar, or pan around by clicking and dragging the mouse on the image.

Selecting duplicate files for further action
You can now select files to delete, move or hard link.  If in doubt, leave alone. To mark a file, in the 'Duplicate Files' tab either click on the checkbox or use the right-click context menu. You can also double click on a file to open it in it's native application for further investigation.

The selection assistant can also help with the marking of files. It can-

• Select oldest or newest file date in each group
• Select smallest or largest file size in each group
• Select all but one file in each group
• Select everything
• Select nothing

Additionally, when in Music Search mode you can select for deletion by audio tags. Options are-

• Keep highest bit rate
• Keep highest sample rate
• Keep longest length

You can also select by a pattern in the file or folder name. For instance if you want to mark everything contained in a 'temp' folder you can use the expression */temp/* in the Path section. Or to select all .bak files you could enter *.bak in the Filename section.

When you are happy with your selection, click on the 'Delete/Move Files' button to action your selection.

Deleting, Moving or Hard Linking Files

After clicking on the 'Delete/Move Files' button a window will pop up summarizing your selections. You now have three options -

Delete Files
This button will delete the selected files. If  'Delete to Recycle Bin' is not checked they will be deleted permanently.

Move Files
You can move your selected files to another folder for safe-keeping, or until such time as you see fit to delete them. With the 'Retain Folder Structure' option selected the files will be placed in folders named according to their original structure.

Create Hard Links 
(What is a Hard Link? From Microsoft.com) A hard link is a directory entry for a file. Every file can be considered to have at least one hard link. On NTFS volumes, each file can have multiple hard links, and thus a single file can appear in many directories (or even in the same directory with different names). Because all of the links reference the same file, programs can open any of the links and modify the file. A file is deleted from the file system only after all links to it have been deleted. After you create a hard link, programs can use it like any other file name.

You can only create hard links on NTFS volumes using Windows XP, 2000, or Vista. You cannot create hard links between volumes (different hard drives or network shares). Duplicate Cleaner will only let you hard link CRC-matched (same content) files.

When creating Hard Links there needs to be at least one file in each duplicate group left unticked. This will be the 'original' file to which the other ticked files in the group are linked. Once linked there will appear to be no difference between the linked file and the original in Windows Explorer.  In addition, hard linked files will appear again as duplicates if you re-scan. (Something to be addressed in future versions of Duplicate Cleaner).

Updates in Version 1.2

Updates in Version 1.1

- CRC Scanning optimized - improved memory footprint
- Multiple folder scans
- Multiple speed optimizations - can run up to 10 times faster.
- Specify file size range
- Faster support for more music formats & improved music search.
- Tabbed interface

 
Additional Credits
This program uses AudioGenie (http://www.audiogenie.de/)