Unable to empty trash

Question

Level 1

15 points

Unable to empty trash

When I try to empty trash my Mac becomes extremely slow and the mouse cursor gets busy unable to do anything else.

Trash cannot be empty. I get the message "The operation cannot be completed because the item "basic" is in use".

Well, it's not in use at least to my perception. I already restarted the OS and tried again. No success.

"basic" is a subdirectory of NeoOffice.app

I also tried to empty trash from command line.

sudo rm -rf NeoOffice.app/
Password:
rm: NeoOffice.app//Contents/share/autocorr: Directory not empty
rm: NeoOffice.app//Contents/share/autotext: Directory not empty
rm: NeoOffice.app//Contents/share/basic: Directory not empty
rm: NeoOffice.app//Contents/share: Directory not empty
rm: NeoOffice.app//Contents: Directory not empty
rm: NeoOffice.app/: Directory not empty

It didn't work. I cannot even ls those subdirectories. It doesn't show any file.

Please help or I will never be able to empty trash.

Thanks,

Martin

iBook G4, Mac OS X (10.4.11), lastest updates

Posted on May 14, 2009 9:22 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Király

Level 6

10,017 points

May 14, 2009 9:24 AM in response to mcanovas

Try holding down the option key while emptying the trash.

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Answer 2

mcanovas Author

Level 1

15 points

May 14, 2009 9:40 AM in response to Király

I tried holding the option key and empty the trash but I still get the same message.

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Answer 3

May 14, 2009 9:51 AM in response to mcanovas

If you have the problem where you can’t empty the Trash or eject a disk because something is preventing you? Usually the reason is because some application has a file open, and thus you can’t get rid of the disk or trash the file. Then use What’s Keeping Me! What’s Keeping Me (10.4) will identify the application that is preventing you from accomplishing your task. You can then use What's Keeping Me to quit, relaunch, or kill the problem application so you can get on with your business.
http://www.hamsoftengineering.com/products/wkm/wkm.html

There's a another way of forcing the Finder to empty the trash no matter what! It is done in the freeware customization and maintenance application OnyX (download @ http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html ). Once you loaded OnyX and entered your administrator password, choose "Cleaning" in the top bar. Click on the "Trash" tab. You can now choose whether you want to "Delete" or to "Securely Delete" (by overwriting) and click Execute. That's it, it will force the Finder to empty the trash even if the files are in use!

Also look at these links.

You can't empty the Trash or move a file to the Trash in Mac OS X
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106272

Solving Trash Problems
http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/trash.html

How To Fix Stubborn Trash and Why it Won't Delete
http://www.osxfaq.com/Tutorials/LearningCenter/HowTo/Trash/index.ws

Download Trash It! v3.6.1 from:
http://www.nonamescriptware.com/?page_id=5

Download DropNuke from:
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/12664

 Cheers, Tom 😉

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Answer 4

BDAqua

Level 10

239,123 points

May 14, 2009 10:36 AM in response to mcanovas

Files in use, here's how to find what is using it...

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20040121001144687

The in Terminal type...

man rmdir

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Answer 5

mcanovas Author

Level 1

15 points

May 14, 2009 4:57 PM in response to Texas Mac Man

Thanks Texas Mac Man!

I tried What's Keeping Me? and that didn't find anything using "basic". Then, I tried OnyX and it told me to run Disk Utility from the Mac OSX Installation DVD which I did, and for my surprise here are the results:

Verifying volume “Macintosh HD”
Checking HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Invalid key length
The volume Macintosh HD needs to be repaired.

Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit

1 HFS volume checked
Volume needs repair

So I tried the repair disk and ...

Keys out of order
Rebuilding Catalog B-tree
The volume Macintosh HD could not be repaired

Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit

----------

I will create a new post for this disk problem in the appropriate forum.
Hopefully this is something that can be fixed by formating the disk.

Thanks for all the help. Those tools didn't help but they are pretty cool and they will come handy in the future.

Martin

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Answer 6

May 14, 2009 5:48 PM in response to mcanovas

Disk Utility can't repair/fix the problems you reported. DiskWarrior can, but you need the DW CD to boot from. DiskWarrior by Alsoft
http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/index.html

 Cheers, Tom 😉

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