CCleaner (also known as Crap Cleaner), developed by Piriform, is a utility program used to clean potentially unwanted files (including temporary internet files, where malicious programs and code tend to reside) and invalid Windows Registry entries from a computer. A public version 1.01 for Mac OS X has been released along with a Network Edition. Its technology includes the ability to defrag the drives and access the system information in the online service Agomo, developed by Piriform.
CCleaner supports the cleaning of temporary or potentially unwanted files left by certain programs, including Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, Safari, Windows Media Player, eMule, Google Toolbar, Netscape, Microsoft Office, Nero, Adobe Acrobat, McAfee, Adobe Flash Player, Sun Java, WinRAR, WinAce, WinZip, GIMP and other applications along with browsing history, cookies, recycle bin, memory dumps, file fragments, log files, system caches, application data, autocomplete form history, and various other data. The program also includes a registry cleaner to locate and correct problems in the Windows registry, such as missing references to shared DLLs, unused registration entries for file extensions, and missing references to application paths.[8] As of v2.27, CCleaner can wipe the MFT free space of a drive, or the entire drive itself.
CCleaner can be employed to uninstall programs. In addition, CCleaner allows the alteration of start-up programs, similar to the Microsoft Windows MSConfig utility. Users can disable start-up programs. As of version 2.19.901, CCleaner also allows users to delete system restore points.[11][12]CNET editors gave the application a rating of 5/5 stars, calling it a "highly-recommended" and "a must-have tool" in spite of some minor glitches. In addition to that, CCleaner was awarded the April 2009 Editor's Choice Award by CNET.[13] As of January 2014, it has been the most popular software on FileHippo for more than a year, and also has a 5-star editor's rating on Softpedia.
