Is there any way to empty the trash on an external hard drive without deleting the files on the Mac's internal hard drive?
Mac mini, macOS 10.15
You should be able to empty the Trash on your external by emptying the Trash on your internal? Why would you have files in the Trash you do not want to empty?
If that isn't working there a utility called Curb you can try:
https://curb.en.softonic.com/mac
You can create a Desktop folder called "Move to Trash" or something like that for items that you want to decide later. That way your Trash won't be cluttered with items that you may or may not want to delete.
If you're familiar with Terminal you can also use the sudo rm command to empty the hidden .Trash folder on the external. (Curb is just a front-end GUI for the same command).
By any chance are these Time Machine files?
The trash bin is there so that if you decide later that you want a file back you can get it. I don't always want to empty my trash bin on my internal hard drive when I have to free up space on an external hard drive, that is why I need the work around. Thank you for the link, unfortunately it will not work with my version of Mac OS. I will try to find another program that will, since I know that they are out there. I will keep curb in mind and hopefully they will eventually make one for the newest Mac OS version.
macjack wrote:
You can create a Desktop folder called "Move to Trash" or something like that for items that you want to decide later.
You could also create a second folder called "Almost Trashed" you could move files to from "Move to Trash" to before actually moving them to the Trash for deletion. 😎
The trash bin is there so that if you decide later that you want a file back you can get it.
Where did you see that explanation?
If you do not want to delete something yet, do as suggested: put it in a separate folder on your desktop. The trash folder is for "trash" = a.k.a. "delete".
Me? I never put files in the Trash unless I want to delete them.
Not you silly. Me either.
Trash on External Hard Drive
