iTJMacattack

Q: How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire mac?

Within the Photos app for OS X you cannot delete a picture permanently from your Mac.

 

(I have imported my existing iPhoto library when I migrated to Photos on 10.10.3)

 

When I delete a picture from Photos. Photos then puts the picture in a trash bin that is hidden in the File button on the task bar - "Show Recently Deleted". When you select this it then shows all of your deleted pictures you selected in Photos. If you then select to "Delete All" it asks you again are your sure and you click ok. Photos then cannot see these photos. BUT IT DID NOT DELETE THEM FROM YOUR MAC!

 

I then opened iPhoto, found the photos that I deleted inside the Photos app and viola they are still there, (these are not thumbnails!) these are the exact picture. HOW DO YOU VERIFY? In iPhoto if you select the picture then go to File - "Reveal in Finder" it will show that the picture you THOUGHT you deleted in Photos, is still there in the Master folder in your library!!

FYI there is no way in Photos to find the file location, very sneaky because the app is not deleting these files. This very frustrating coming from Apple who is pushing thinner profiles so SSD's with very limited storage, to give you the assumption that you are actually deleting these photos and videos when in fact you are not.

 

Question again is...

How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire Mac?

Does anyone have a solution other than don't use Photos.

 

This question was asked and solved already but I have verified that "Delete All" in the hidden trash can in Photos does in fact not delete from your disk space! Have a video on my YouTube Channel iTJMacattack that shows this issue - for proof.

 

Please real help and a solution!!

 

Thanks,

MacBook Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on Apr 12, 2015 9:28 AM

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Q: How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire mac?

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  • by MacBookBear,

    MacBookBear MacBookBear Aug 20, 2015 9:37 AM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 20, 2015 9:37 AM in response to LarryHN

    Ive just deleted my Photos content using the advice posted here by sbunns, and it hasn't freed up any space on my HD.

     

    I opened Photos, selected all 14,844 images and deleted them.

    Went to Recently Deleted Photos and clicked on delete.

     

    When going to About This Mac > Storage I don't have any more free space than when I started.

  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad Aug 20, 2015 9:50 AM in response to MacBookBear
    Level 10 (141,304 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 20, 2015 9:50 AM in response to MacBookBear
    I opened Photos, selected all 14,844 images and deleted them.

    If you're going to do that then just drag the Photos library package to the Trash bin in the Dock and empty it.  It's the most effective way to do what you did.

     

    And forget about the About This Mac âž™ Storage.  It's notoriously inefficient and erroneous.  The best indication is to Control (right) - click on your hard drive's icon on the Desktop and select Get Info from the contextual menu.  In the Info window will be the amount of used and free space:

    HDinfowindow.png

     

    If that size doesn't jive with what you think it should be reindex the disk for Spotlight according to this Apple document: Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes - Apple Support

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Aug 20, 2015 10:05 AM in response to MacBookBear
    Level 10 (85,032 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Aug 20, 2015 10:05 AM in response to MacBookBear

    Rather than use Photos of delete since you want everything gone simply drag the Photos library to the trash and empty the trash - of course if the original iPhoto library is still there this will release very little space as they share the masters and previews and they will still be there - Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries - Apple Support

     

    LN

  • by MacBookBear,

    MacBookBear MacBookBear Aug 20, 2015 11:27 AM in response to Old Toad
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 20, 2015 11:27 AM in response to Old Toad

    Thanks for the reply.

     

    I didn't realise that Photos & iPhoto images shared the same space. I only use iPhoto and regret upgrading to Photos, but of course you have to update the operating system eventually.

  • by DPL19702,

    DPL19702 DPL19702 Aug 26, 2015 12:39 PM in response to sbunns
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 26, 2015 12:39 PM in response to sbunns

    Did exactly as instructed here.

    Deleted over 1000 pictures and 50 large movie files.

    And actually lost available space on my hard drive.

    So confused as to why this is so difficult.

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Aug 26, 2015 12:47 PM in response to DPL19702
    Level 10 (85,032 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Aug 26, 2015 12:47 PM in response to DPL19702

    Well you did something wrong - but threadJacking an existing thread with several different problems is not a good way to get help

     

    Please start a new thread including all the specifics about you unique problem and exactly what you have done to resolve it in detail

     

    see Writing an effective Apple Support Communities question for assistance in writing your question

     

    LN

  • by DPL19702,

    DPL19702 DPL19702 Aug 26, 2015 1:04 PM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 26, 2015 1:04 PM in response to LarryHN

    Wow.

    I responded to the post below and it dropped it here at the end of the string... so much for context:

    As far a treadjacking goes... ah NO.  I'm not.  This thread is clearly about not gaining disk space when deleting items from Photos and iPhoto.

    I didn't realize the "reply" button on a message on this site doesn't actually reply to that message at all it just adds it to the end of the string.  Now that I realize that,  please find my full message with the proper context below.  ( And just to be clear I did not do something wrong per the instructions provided below).

     

    To delete photos from the Photos app in OS X, do the following:

     

    -Open the Photos application and select the photo(s) you wish to delete in the All Photos section.

    -Press command+delete on your keyboard to delete the photos.

    -Next, in the menu bar at the top of your screen, click File > Show Recently Deleted.

    -Find and select the photo(s) that you just deleted.

    -Click the "Delete # Items" button, at the top right corner of the Photos applications.

    -You will see a message warning you that you are about to permanently delete the selected photos and this action cannot be undone. Click OK.

     

    Your photo(s) will now be removed from the "Masters" folder in your "Photo Library" and deleted from you hard drive forever.

     

      

      

    Did exactly as instructed here.

    Deleted over 1000 pictures and 50 large movie files.

    And actually lost available space on my hard drive.

    So confused as to why this is so difficult.

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Aug 26, 2015 1:14 PM in response to DPL19702
    Level 10 (85,032 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Aug 26, 2015 1:14 PM in response to DPL19702

    Again it would be much smarter to start a new thread since this is so convoluted and impossible to follow - but you do what you want - you are much more likely to resolve this with a coherent thread to post in

     

    Following those instructions will not increase disk usage - depending on undisclosed information it might leave it the same

     

    Do you have a referenced or managed library? Do you still have an iPhoto library that they were migrated from on disk? If so you need to delete from there too - or if you are positive that you  are finished with iphoto trash the iPhoto library

     

    LN

  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad Aug 26, 2015 1:13 PM in response to DPL19702
    Level 10 (141,304 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 26, 2015 1:13 PM in response to DPL19702

    Reindex your hard drive according to this Apple document: Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes - Apple Support

  • by DPL19702,

    DPL19702 DPL19702 Aug 26, 2015 1:19 PM in response to Old Toad
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 26, 2015 1:19 PM in response to Old Toad

    Old Toad,

    How long does re-indexing take? I ask bc followed those directions as well earlier but I can't tell if the mac is doing anything and nothing has changed with available space yet.  Seems like something that would take some time to complete. 

    Thanks

    Dan

  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad Aug 26, 2015 1:27 PM in response to DPL19702
    Level 10 (141,304 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 26, 2015 1:27 PM in response to DPL19702

    It can take up to an hour depending on how big the drive is and how many files are on it.  Open Activity Monitor and check the CPU section to see how much mdworker is running. 

  • by MacBookBear,

    MacBookBear MacBookBear Aug 26, 2015 1:50 PM in response to Old Toad
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 26, 2015 1:50 PM in response to Old Toad

    What does Re-indexing the hard drive actually do please?

  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad Aug 26, 2015 2:03 PM in response to MacBookBear
    Level 10 (141,304 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 26, 2015 2:03 PM in response to MacBookBear

    It lets Spotlight go thru all of the file on the hard drive and index the file names and contents so you can search for any work or phrase in a document on the drive or by file name, etc. It also re reads the file sizes.

     

    The Spotligh index is what lets you quickly find all files with a certain phrase or work in them, .........

  • by MacBookBear,

    MacBookBear MacBookBear Aug 26, 2015 3:08 PM in response to Old Toad
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 26, 2015 3:08 PM in response to Old Toad

    Thanks.

     

    Sounds similar to the search function in iPhoto which allows you to quickly search for images with certain info..

     

    Screen Shot 2015-08-26 at 23.05.05.png

  • by romit.73,

    romit.73 romit.73 Sep 10, 2015 1:29 PM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 10, 2015 1:29 PM in response to iTJMacattack

    Ok, i have this problem too. I didn't import anything from iPhotos. I started fresh. I installed Photos and turned on iCloud Photo Library.

     

    iTJMacattack wrote:

     

    Within the Photos app for OS X you cannot delete a picture permanently from your Mac.

     

    (I have imported my existing iPhoto library when I migrated to Photos on 10.10.3)

     

    When I delete a picture from Photos. Photos then puts the picture in a trash bin that is hidden in the File button on the task bar - "Show Recently Deleted". When you select this it then shows all of your deleted pictures you selected in Photos. If you then select to "Delete All" it asks you again are your sure and you click ok. Photos then cannot see these photos. BUT IT DID NOT DELETE THEM FROM YOUR MAC!

     

    I then opened iPhoto, found the photos that I deleted inside the Photos app and viola they are still there, (these are not thumbnails!) these are the exact picture. HOW DO YOU VERIFY? In iPhoto if you select the picture then go to File - "Reveal in Finder" it will show that the picture you THOUGHT you deleted in Photos, is still there in the Master folder in your library!!

    FYI there is no way in Photos to find the file location, very sneaky because the app is not deleting these files. This very frustrating coming from Apple who is pushing thinner profiles so SSD's with very limited storage, to give you the assumption that you are actually deleting these photos and videos when in fact you are not.

     

    Question again is...

    How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire Mac?

    Does anyone have a solution other than don't use Photos.

     

    This question was asked and solved already but I have verified that "Delete All" in the hidden trash can in Photos does in fact not delete from your disk space! Have a video on my YouTube Channel iTJMacattack that shows this issue - for proof.

     

    Please real help and a solution!!

     

    Thanks,

     

    Now here's the thing, i tried all the steps mentioned above like, show recently deleted and deleted from there permanently. But when i go to the masters folder, all the photos are still there. Because i have enable iCloud photo library, i delete photos from my iPhone too. It gets removed from the photos app on mac, but still are available there in masters folder.

    I am using MacBook Pro Yosemite

    and iPhone 5s iOS 8.4.3

     

    Please help!

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