artifact-janitor_skill

Overview

This skill is a tactical cleanup and optimization tool for modern 2026 development environments. It reclaims disk space, removes corrupted build artifacts, and restores build health in large monorepos and JS/TS workspaces. The focus is safe, automated discovery and removal of caches and redundant dependencies without risking repository integrity.

How this skill works

artifact-janitor scans projects and user caches to locate multi-gigabyte build artifacts (node_modules, .next, .turbo, tsbuildinfo, framework caches). It offers dry-run analysis, targeted removal, and automation via a robust deep-clean.sh script that reports reclaimed space and enforces safety checks. Post-clean verification steps ensure builds and type checks succeed before finishing.

When to use it

• When disk usage from build caches exceeds acceptable limits or slows developer workflows
• If builds show intermittent or "ghost" errors that likely come from corrupted artifacts
• Before archiving or sharing a repository to avoid shipping local artifacts
• During CI tuning to remove unnecessary caches while preserving incremental performance
• When onboarding contributors to quickly normalize environment sizes across machines

Best practices

• Always run --dry-run first to preview deletions and sizes
• Protect vital files like .git and .env by adding them to a protected list
• Check for running node/bun/vite processes before deleting to avoid partial cleanup
• Prefer targeted invalidation (tsconfig.tsbuildinfo, framework caches) over blind rm -rf
• Use automation hooks in CI with conservative settings to avoid breaking incremental builds

Example use cases

• Resolve "Property X does not exist" type errors by removing tsconfig.tsbuildinfo and .next types
• Reclaim dozens of GBs in a monorepo by removing recursive node_modules and framework caches
• Pre-archive scrub: run deep-clean.sh --dry-run then execute to create a lean project artifact
• CI cleanup job that prunes pnpm store and workspace node_modules with safety checks
• Recover from branch-switch build failures by wiping node_modules and reinstalling with bun