Does Safe Boot clean font caches?

Question

Does Safe Boot clean font caches?

I found this in the OS10.4.11 Help file under Safe Boot:

"Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger only: It moves to the Trash all font caches normally stored in /Library/Caches/com.apple.ATS/(uid)/ , where (uid) is a user ID number such as 501."

Someone in another forum tells me that it isn't true. Is it?

2.2 Macbook Pro, Mac OS X (10.4.10), 2GB, Fast 160HD

Posted on Feb 25, 2008 11:03 AM

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Answer 1

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,596 points

Feb 25, 2008 11:21 AM in response to Michael Gianino

Yes, it does. Works in Leopard, too.

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Answer 2

Feb 25, 2008 11:58 AM in response to Kurt Lang

Here is the reason I was given that it doesn't work:

"Nevertheless, what the Mac Help file say is not quite true: the fonts cache are not all cleaned after a Safe Boot. Look a glance after this kind of boot to the modification dates to all files housed in all these folders in this directory and you'll notice that some older still remain."

How would you respond to that?

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Answer 3

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,596 points

Feb 25, 2008 12:17 PM in response to Michael Gianino

Depends on what you're looking at. If you go by your original question, then the answer is yes. When you start up in Safe Mode, the cache files for the person who logs in are trashed. If you're the only user, then that would be the 501 folder, as you first asked. Restarting normally then allows the OS to create a completely new set of cache files for that same user. If you mean all cache files, then no. The System cache files are not replaced on a Safe Mode startup.

So the font cache files for your account are indeed gone and replaced with new copies. The System's font cache files are not. If you want to clear everything, you can just put the folder com.apple.ATS in the trash and restart. If you do manually trash the cache files, make sure all applications are first shut down. More importantly, immediately restart after dragging that folder to the trash.

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Answer 4

Feb 25, 2008 12:45 PM in response to Kurt Lang

So, if there were more than one user account, safe boot will only clear the font cache for the user who logs in while in safe boot. And if you then logged in as another user, it would clean out that cache (not that this is what people would normally do, but I'm just trying to understand all of this).

But, the system font cache is not effected, right? So if I suspect a font cache is causing problems, leaving the system cache unchanged might not relieve the problem.

So, the font caches in question are:

HD>Library>Caches>com.apple.ATS (and everything within that folder),
HD>System>Library>Caches>com.apple.ATS.System.fcache

and there is a caches folder in:
HD>Users>My UserName>Library>Caches>

…which I gather is where the user cache is (the one that Safe Boot cleans), but I didn't see a com.apple.ats in there. Have I gone down the wrong path?

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Answer 5

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,596 points

Feb 25, 2008 12:51 PM in response to Michael Gianino

So, if there were more than one user account, safe boot will only clear the font cache for the user who logs in while in safe boot. And if you then logged in as another user, it would clean out that cache (not that this is what people would normally do, but I'm just trying to understand all of this).

But, the system font cache is not affected, right? So if I suspect a font cache is causing problems, leaving the system cache unchanged might not relieve the problem.

You've got it!

Rather than trying to track all of the various font cache (and other cache files) yourself, there are free utilities you can download that do all of the work for you. Font Finagler clears just font cache files. If you want to clear other cache files at the same time, OnyX can do that.

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Answer 6

Feb 25, 2008 1:23 PM in response to Kurt Lang

Thanks Kurt. I owe you a cyber beer.

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Answer 7

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,596 points

Feb 25, 2008 1:26 PM in response to Michael Gianino

You're welcome, Michael. Glad to help.

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