[Messiahtosh]

I want to delete some content in my trash can, but I get a message that says something is in use when it's not. I want to delete it, and I don't care what the system is telling me. How do I "force-delete" what's in my trash?

[Brad]

Type exactly as entered, double-check it, and triple-check it before pressing enter. A typo here could be disastrous:

sudo rm -rf ~/.Trash

Alternatively, you could type this (without pressing enter afterwards):

sudo rm -rf

...add a space to the end of that, and then drag the offending file into the Terminal window. It'll auto-complete the path for that specific file. Then, press enter and it'll force it to be deleted.

If you don't want to play with the Terminal, I do believe there are several utilities on MacUpdate that will force delete the trash for you.

[Messiahtosh]

The ever helpful Brad has done it again! Thanks man.

[BarracksSi]

Doesn't it work to option-click the Empty Trash command?

[Brad]

Yes and no.

Holding the option key does two things. 1: It empties the trash without notification. 2: It deletes locked files.

Files that are "in use" are treated differently than locked files because any processes accessing them may crash. On very rare occasions, particularly if a program or the whole system hangs or crashes, some files may be left in this "in use" state.

[curiousuburb]

You can also restart the Mac... usually "in use" flags get reset and Trash can be emptied.

[Chinney]

Originally Posted by curiousuburb You can also restart the Mac... usually "in use" flags get reset and Trash can be emptied.

That's the way I have always done it.

I don't know if I would want to risk Brad's method. Tyyypos are just tooo easy two doo.

[scratt]

Another way is to choose "Secure Empty Trash".
Just next to "Empty Trash" in the Finder menu.

I am not sure why it works but it does... If you look at the purpose of secure empty trash it seems to have nothing to do with getting rid of busy or locked files... But it does.

It does mean you don't have to reboot and you don't have to risk typos on scary commands!!

[autodata]

Originally Posted by Chinney I don't know if I would want to risk Brad's method. Tyyypos are just tooo easy two doo.

Well, a safer way might be to cd ~/.Trash then ls to make sure you are in the right place and to get the filenames, then rm -rf [filename] on each one individually.

But if secure empty trash works, that looks like the best way to go.

[thuh Freak]

i think secure trash emptying is just the OS' way of hiding "sudo rm -fr ~/.Trash/*". and using sudo means "dont fuck with me. i'm root."

[scratt]

I thought the intended purpose of "Secure Empty Trash" was to zero the contents of the space used to store the files...

It seems to take an awfully long time which would suggest it is infact doing that.

But it seems that the handy side effect is that it also does the "Don't fuck with me" thing and ignores any kind of file in use, or file locked tags.

Probably far to dangerous to have a single click to start it!
It would be cool if it had a little saftey cover like the Burn widget in iTunes.

Anyway have to dash now.. Off to the Full Moon Party... It's a day's journey from Bangkok... And I want to get there for the warm up...

See ya on the flip side... :smokey:

[autodata]

it's probably sudo srm, but I don't remember hearing it was doing it under sudo.

[thuh Freak]

Originally Posted by autodata it's probably sudo srm, but I don't remember hearing it was doing it under sudo.

o yea, i forgot about that part. but even if its not using sudo, it seems to get root access somehow.

[curiousuburb]

Originally Posted by scratt Anyway have to dash now.. Off to the Full Moon Party... It's a day's journey from Bangkok... And I want to get there for the warm up... See ya on the flip side... :smokey:

Full Moon parties are good... Black Moon parties are better (if you can remember them).

At least it was like that near Koh Phangan late last century.

[BarracksSi]

Originally Posted by scratt I thought the intended purpose of "Secure Empty Trash" was to zero the contents of the space used to store the files... It seems to take an awfully long time which would suggest it is infact doing that.

You mentioned it before I got back from work..

Yup, that's what "Secure Empty Trash" does -- writes over the data in multiple passes, scrambling it to Department of Defense standards for erased data. The regular "Empty Trash" command just deletes it out of the index, effectively putting a "1" in front of the file. That's why someone can recover files that you "deleted" just by choosing Empty Trash.

This was a noteworthy item when Panther came out. I'm surprised that it's not common knowledge by now.

[curiousuburb]

Originally Posted by BarracksSi You mentioned it before I got back from work.. Yup, that's what "Secure Empty Trash" does -- writes over the data in multiple passes, scrambling it to Department of Defense standards for erased data. The regular "Empty Trash" command just deletes it out of the index, effectively putting a "1" in front of the file. That's why someone can recover files that you "deleted" just by choosing Empty Trash. This was a noteworthy item when Panther came out. I'm surprised that it's not common knowledge by now.

OS 9 empty trash (and most Windows OS) just remove knowledge of the file from the index or FAT table and generally don't actually delete the file, just the references to it.

Part of the reason is may be possible to undelete such a file is that no overwrites of the data take place because it is possible that no other process has reclaimed the disk space. If you've had lots of disk activity since your deletion, the odds of recovering any file drop due the chance its space has been reclaimed or overwritten since.

OS X (most 'nix) always has multiple processes running, some with hefty Virtual Memory demands.
OS X (most 'nix) aggressively reclaim drivespace and 'defrags files under 20MB on the fly'.
OS X empty trash (a shell for 'nix rm -rf) has no 'undelete' option. File is toast.

The combination of the first two conditions alone dramatically increases the chance a file's data gets overwritten or reclaimed and tend to mean deleted data in 'nix is unrecoverable.

As for the 'secure empty trash' being noteworthy in Panther, a similar toolset to actively overwrite DoD3/7/9 times has existed since at least the nineties.

Incinerator, Shredder, and various other 3rd party DAs or apps shipped for just such a market.

Apple has finally rolled some more security into the default install... same as FileVault and the earlier incarnations of encrypted disk images. But if you really wanted a secure laptop before now, you could have bought the clunky Mac OS 9 version of PGP, too.

Apple may have absorbed a technology or integrated one into a more elegant solution. Doubt the overwriting software was proprietary, though in these days of the DMCA who knows.

[autodata]

Originally Posted by curiousuburb Apple may have absorbed a technology or integrated one into a more elegant solution. Doubt the overwriting software was proprietary, though in these days of the DMCA who knows.

Like I said above, my understanding is that it's using srm.

Does anyone know if 'empty trash' is using rm with some flags or is it something totally different?