Applications

AppUnwind can review ordinary applications in /Applications and ~/Applications, including apps installed manually and apps with relevant Homebrew Cask metadata. Apple system apps are display-only. Some products require their vendor-supported uninstaller.

Bounded support locations

Discovery covers documented user and system Library categories such as Application Support, Caches, Containers, Group Containers, Preferences, Logs, Saved Application State, LaunchAgents, and privileged helper metadata when readable. Each result retains its concrete evidence.

Limited and full coverage

Without Full Disk Access, macOS may deny specific folders. AppUnwind stays usable, reports Limited coverage, and lists the unreadable locations. Granting access and rescanning can expand visibility; it never changes selection or protection rules.

Vendor workflows

VPN clients, endpoint security tools, antivirus products, drivers, system extensions, kernel or network extensions, and tamper-protected software may need an authenticated vendor workflow. AppUnwind does not claim to bypass that workflow or force-remove root-owned components.

Volumes and restore

Items on the same volume are moved into quarantine. For a cross-volume transfer, the copy must match its SHA-256 digest before removal of the source. Restore refuses to overwrite a newer file already at the original path and offers a conflict-safe decision instead.

Deliberate limits

AppUnwind does not recursively search personal documents, infer ownership from creation dates, follow symbolic links, erase data irreversibly, or represent unreadable folders as clean. Those limits are part of the safety model.