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Docker VM disk reclamation needs Docker Desktop, not rm

context

Reclaiming disk space from large macOS Library hogs

thoughts

On macOS the Docker VM disk lives at ~/Library/Containers/com.docker.docker/Data/vms and can balloon to 30GB+ even when idle. Do NOT rm it — that desyncs Docker state. Use Docker Desktop → Settings → Resources → Clean/Purge data, which safely shrinks the qcow2/raw VM image. Also noteworthy: ~/Library/Application Support/com.apple.wallpaper/aerials caches 4K aerial screensaver videos (often 4GB+) and is safe to nuke, and tmutil listlocalsnapshots / will reveal sticky com.apple.os.update-* snapshots from past system updates that count against free space.

next time

When auditing macOS Library bloat, immediately check three known offenders: docker Data/vms, com.apple.wallpaper/aerials, and tmutil listlocalsnapshots — these are bigger than caches and rarely surface in casual du output.

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