Is there a way to list files added/removed/modified during application installation in Mac OS X Yosemite?

Question

In Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite, how can I list all files that were added, removed, or modified during an application installation?

One thought is to snapshot the drive before and after, or another is to list recently added, removed or modified files. Or perhaps it’s possible to inspect Time Machine diffs.

Answer 1

This is actually a decent question. I don’t believe there is a simple answer. Maybe cloning the drive before and after would glean some clues? Barring that, I think maybe using find would help? Something like this; proof of concept:

find ~ -type f -cmin -30 | more

That command specifically would use find to search for any item in your home directory (~) that is a file (-type f) that has been created in the last 30 minutes (-cmin -30). The output of find is piped to more for easy reading, but you could also send the results to a file for later review like this:

find ~ -type f -cmin -30 >> find_file.txt

Now of course this is far from perfect for a per application review of what has been installed. Not to mention that for the purposes outlined in the question, the directory path of ~ would have to be expanded to cover the whole drive with / like this:

find / -type f -cmin -30 >> find_file.txt

But at least this gives you something to start with. Perhaps do a scan like this before the software install and the after the software install, diff the documents and take it from there? Run this find command before you install software:

find / -type f -cmin -30 >> find_file_before.txt

Then run this find command after you install software:

find / -type f -cmin -30 >> find_file_after.txt

Then just diff those two files.

Of course you can experiment with changing the -cmin -30 to something smaller like -cmin -10 or even longer like -cmin -60 but that depends on your goals. And of course your life would be made easier by filtering out some caches/ephemeral files that just get created/trashed by the system in normal use. But then again, focusing on what exactly you would want to ignore from a find connected to a software install is up to you to explore and refine.