Where Is Mac's Library Folder

Then there is the /Library folder that's located in the Home folder. The third Library folder is located in System and contains all the files that MacOS needs to run. Spot the difference.

  1. Jan 19, 2020  They’re buried in a folder in the Library, and the archive uses a.mbox file extension. Since there may be times you want to copy your email to another computer, or even back up stored messages, here's how to find and access all your stored Mail email files. To locate the folder where Mac OS X Mail version 1 stores mail.
  2. Aug 03, 2017 Hi all, while doing some summer cleaning, I noticed a huge Library folder in my User part, a whooping 85GB one. Considering I have a 256GB SSD, it's taking up quite the space. The 'small' stuff is Safari as 1,3GB and Mail with 9GB, what do you think these are? Then I have Caches for 15GB.
  3. May 01, 2019  There are actually three library folders on a Mac. The library folder in the root directory of your system drive (usually called Macintosh HD) contains data accessible to all users, but only administrators have write access to the files.

The Library folder, at the root level of your Mac OS X Lion hard drive, is like a public library; it stores items available to everyone who logs into an account on this Mac. You can find three Library folders on your hard drive: the one at the root level of your OS X disk, a second inside the root-level System folder, and a third in your Home folder.

In earlier versions of Mac OS X, you would have seen a folder named Library between the Downloads and Movies folders in your Home folder. But that was then, and this is now. In Mac OS X Lion, the Home Library folder is hidden from view to protect you from yourself.

Leave the /System/Libraryfolder alone. Don’t move, remove, or rename it, or do anything within it. It’s the nerve center of your Mac. In other words, you should never have to touch this third Library folder.

You find a bunch of folders inside the Library folder at root level (the public Library folder). Most of them contain files that you never need to open, move, or delete.

By and large, the public Library subfolder that gets the most use is the Fonts folder, which houses many of the fonts installed on the Mac. For the most part, fonts can be made available in one of two ways:

  • To everyone who uses the Mac: If that’s the case, they’re stored in the Fonts folder.

  • To a single user: In this case, you place the fonts in the user’s Library folder (the one in the user’s Home folder).

Some other public Library subfolders that you might use or add to are the iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and iDVD folders (where you put plug-ins for those programs); the Scripts folder (which houses AppleScripts accessible to all users); and the Desktop Pictures folder (where you can place pictures to be used as Desktop backgrounds).

Leave the “public” Library folder pretty much alone unless you’re using the Fonts folder or know what you’re adding to one of the other folders. Don’t remove, rename, or move any files or folders. Mac OS X uses these items and is very picky about where they’re kept and how they’re named.

You can easily delete all the directories with age a week and higher./Library/Developer/Xcode/Archives same story here, but you need to be more careful with removing old archive files (especially if your projects are not under version control).By my experience archive folder for an app can become really huge as developers usually create lots of versions of same app before its public releases. For Developers:/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData directory can become pretty large after some time of creating different projects. Use cd again to drill further done and repeat the du command.PS: Just for reference: My Library folder currently holds about 16 GB of Evernote data, 4 GB Developer docs from Xcode, 1 GB mail and 1.5 GB iOS software updates. Library I believe it's better to clean this folder from XCode by going through all your old archives and removing the ones you don't need. sort -nwhich will show you the largest directories at the end.

If your Mac is set up for multiple users, only users with administrator (admin) privileges can put stuff in the public (root-level) Library folder.

Your Photos library holds all your photos, albums, slideshows, and print projects. If your library is large, and you want to free up storage space on your Mac, turn on iCloud Photo Library and use Optimize Mac Storage, or move your library to an external drive.

Before you start, be sure to back up your library.

Prepare your drive

You can store your library on an external storage device, such as a USB or Thunderbolt drive formatted as APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled).1 Find out how to check the format of your external storage device.

To prevent data loss, Apple doesn't recommend storing photo libraries on external storage devices like SD cards and USB flash drives, or drives that are shared on a network.

Move your Photos library to an external storage device

  1. Quit Photos.
  2. In the Finder, go to the external drive where you want to store your library.
  3. In another Finder window, find your library. The default location is Users > [username] > Pictures, and it's named Photos Library.
  4. Drag your library to its new location on the external drive. If you see an error, select your external drive's icon in the Finder, then choose File > Get Info. If the information under Sharing & Permissions isn't visible, click , then make sure the 'Ignore ownership on this volume' checkbox is selected. If it's not selected, click to unlock it, enter an administrator name and password, then select the checkbox.2

  5. After the move is finished, double-click Photos Library in its new location to open it.
  6. If you use iCloud Photo Library, designate this library as the System Photo Library.

Where Is My Library Folder

Delete original library to save space

After you open your library from its new location and make sure that it works as expected, you can delete the library from its original location.

In a Finder window, go back to your Pictures folder (or whichever folder you copied your library from) and move Photos Library to the trash. Then choose Finder > Empty Trash to delete the library and reclaim disk space.

Open another Photos library

If you have multiple libraries, here's how to open a different one:

Where Is Mac's Library Folder Windows 10

  1. Quit Photos.
  2. Press and hold the Option key while you open Photos.
  3. Select the library that you want to open, then click Choose Library.

Photos uses this library until you open a different one.

Learn more

If you have a permissions issue with your library, you might be able to resolve the issue by using the Photos library repair tool.

1. You can't move your library to a disk that's used for Time Machine backups.

Where Is Mac's Library Folder In Firefox

2. If the volume isn't formatted APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled), or has been used for Time Machine backups but hasn't been erased, this checkbox will either not be present, or won't be selectable after unlocking. Erase and reformat the drive for this option to be available.