NOTHING Will Empty Trash

Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on resolving Trash problems.

Do you get a note that it is still in use? Restart your mac and that sometimes helps. If that does not work boot-up into Safe Mode.

Here's a trick that may work. Open TextEdit and create two new files (may be empty) with the exact same names as those in the Trash. Then trash the two files and see if you can now empty the Trash.

FIRST, MAKE SURE TO BACKUP YOUR DATA! See my FAQ*:

http://www.macmaps.com/backup.html

If all you have is one partition, and no other external drives are attached, and no digital camera media is inside any attached printer or media card reader, and the file is in there and won't trash after booting into safe mode, boot into single user mode.

To boot into single user mode, hold command and S key keys down simultaneously.

at the prompt type the following:

rm -r ~/.Trash/*

ls ~/.Trash/

if there are still files inside you may have other data corruption which needs to be dealt with. Let us know if this is the case.

- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.

Yes that does. It should have deleted the file. If it didn't, open the Terminal window and type:

ls -aL

And tell us the results.

When you start your computer in single user mode the file system is read-only. In other words, you cannot make changes to the file system until you mount the file system read-write. So the proper procedure would be to start the operating system holding down the command key and the s key at boot time and then run a file system consistency check first ->

fsck -fy

If the file system is modified then run fsck -fy unitl it does not say that it has been modified. Then mount the file system read-write ->

mount -uw /

The user is root not a regular or an admin user. So, you need to point the rm command to the absolute path to the .Trash directory that needs to be emptied.

Bit confused because you don't seem to even be in Trash directory to see what's in that. Try: cd ~/.Trash then run ls -aL and ls -al and see what's in your user trash.

In other words:

cd ~/.Trash

Then:

ls -aL

And tell us the results. Just clarifying Doug's request, in event you didn't understand his request.

I was going to suggest the same.

However he got this into the trash, who knows. It's part of the PDFX setup under Print menu. The location and ownership are:
doug-penningtons-power-mac-g4:~ dougp$ ls -al /System/Library/Frameworks/Quartz.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/QuartzFilters .framework/Versions/A/Resources/English.lproj/QFilterPDFXTrimBox.nib
total 40
drwxr-xr-x 5 root wheel 170 Sep 23 2007 .
drwxr-xr-x 39 root wheel 1326 Sep 23 2007 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root wheel 1125 Sep 23 2007 classes.nib
-rw-r--r-- 1 root wheel 607 Sep 23 2007 info.nib
-rw-r--r-- 1 root wheel 9452 Sep 23 2007 keyedobjects.nib
But Aaron says that file is empty. Otherwise I'd try an mv on it back to it's proper area(excuse the terminology). Does a complete one still exist at location above on Aaron's machine? Still need to see his Trash ls -al answer. The other file, there are lots of them.

Are you saying he attempted to delete a file from within that English.lproj folder?
No wonder his system is running amuck. Never touch any file in the /System/ folder. Permissions can get really messed up, making the whole system not able to be booted. Quartz is important for drawing graphics on the computer screen. Best course of action here, backup what's important*:

http://www.macmaps.com/backup.html

Erase and install the operating system.

Import the data back using this migration tip:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=435350&tstart=0

And never touch the /System/ folder again. That's not for anyone's consumption except system level programmers.

- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.

Message was edited by: a brody

a brody, I don't know what he did but something seems to be tied to that nib file and his problems. But the biggest problem on these forums is the call for help and then the disappearance act that goes with it. Doug