I recently put all my stuff into a single database. From time to time I optimize it using the built in scripts, but I started to notice that every time I rebuild the database (“Neuaufbau der Datenbank” in German), it gets bigger.
I just erased a 900MB index of my media files in order to keep the size of the DB in check, but that just gave me back about 200MB.
So right now I have about 1.6GB worth of files (according to the built in “Info”) in a 4.14GB database.
Any ideas?
One place to start is to look at your preference settings for backups and see how many it is set to. You can also delete all the backup files from the database and see if that helps. Quit DT and in the Finder, right-click on your database and select ‘Show Package Contents’. You can safely delete all the folders named ‘Backup’, ‘Backup.0’, etc.
The above may help, but unless you have the preference set to keep an unusually high number of backups, I doubt you will regain a significant amount of disk space.
Aw man, I forgot that the backups are stored inside the DB file… which is now down to under 1GB. Which is actually a little scary 
Thanks a lot.
I stick with the default 3 internal Backup folders, which can be very convenient were something to happen that seriously damages a database. Once can then revert to the most recent internal backup of an undamaged state of the database, using Tools > Restore Backup.
My Macs have plenty of free drive space. Those internal Backup folders don’'t duplicate the actual document files contained in the database, but only indexing and metadata.
But that’s not an adequate backup strategy for all possible Bad Things that might happen. If your hard dish were to crash, the internal backups are gone, along with your other data.
I use Time Machine, and also database archives that I store off-site.