Can't delete / empty trash can. Please help

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kairos33 Author

Level 1

47 points

Can't delete / empty trash can. Please help

I try deleting my trash can files but I keep getting this error. "the operation can't be completed because the . . .

item Library" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "System" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "libexec" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "share" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "usr" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "2018-09-11-110836" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "user's MacBook Pro" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

item "Backups.backupdb" is in use. When I click Continue, I get . . .

The errors stop and nothing is deleted from my trash

FYI, I rebooted into safe mode to no avail

Below I attached an image of what exactly is in my trash can

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 10.13

Posted on Jan 10, 2021 6:42 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Sean_W.

Level 6

8,236 points

Jan 10, 2021 7:23 PM in response to kairos33

Are you trying to delete a Time Machine backup from your external drive?

Here are some steps that may help.

Copy items (excluding Time Machine backups) from your external drive to another location temporarily.
If you have Time Machine backups of content no longer on the corresponding Mac, contact Apple Support. If you have all the content you need on your Mac, you can continue with the following steps.
Erase the external drive with Disk Utility.
Set up Time Machine again and back up your Mac.
- "Time Machine automatically makes hourly backups for the past 24 hours, daily backups for the past month, and weekly backups for all previous months. The oldest backups are deleted when your backup disk is full."

If you plan to store items on the external drive in addition to your Time Machine backups, allocate the appropriate amount of space.

If your Mac is running macOS Big Sur, format the external drive as APFS and add a volume.
If your Mac is running macOS Catalina or earlier, format the external drive as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with two partitions.

Here are some articles about upgrading macOS.

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Answer 2

Jan 10, 2021 6:49 PM in response to kairos33

STOP trying to do that.

You can NOT manually delete ANYTHING from Time Machine backups using Finder. If you succeed in doing so, your backup SET (all backups on that drive) will be irreparably damaged.

Time machine manages the free space remaining on the drive all by itself. Having unused space on the drive provides NO advantage.

If you wish, you can request the removal of ONE backup at a time using Time Machine .app (not to be confused with Time machine preference pane).

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Answer 3

kairos33 Author

Level 1

47 points

Jan 11, 2021 3:28 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Thank you. You are correct. One thing I should’ve mentioned was, I wanted to start from scratch 30 minutes after starting the first ever time machine back up. So I know how Time Machine works but I wanted to delete the entire time machine back up because I decided not to use it on that hard drive so in this special case, I do actually want to completely delete the back up on that hard drive. It’s OK. Given my unorthodox goal, can you tell me again, what specifically I should do?

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Answer 4

kairos33 Author

Level 1

47 points

Jan 11, 2021 3:31 AM in response to Sean_W.

Yes, I am trying to delete the entire time machine back up folder from the hard drive. I also realize when you use Time Machine, it’s highly recommended you do not have any other independent files sitting on the hard drive. Are used Time Machine on three different hard drives in case one falls which happened in the past and I lost everything and in the same day my MacBook went down. It was a literally worst case scenario so now I’m overly paranoid. But anyway, back to my point. I do want to delete the back up on this hard drive but I should have mentioned, I can’t format the hard drive because I did take some not recommended steps here and I have some independent files on that hard drive I want to keep, even though I know it’s recommended not to do that

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Answer 5

Jan 11, 2021 7:14 AM in response to kairos33

<< I wanted to start [Time machine backups] from scratch >>

Answer: ERASE the backup drive.

That leaves you 'working without a net' for an afternoon, but if this is still early, that should not be a big issue.

Another interesting thing Time machine can do is to ADD additional Drive(s). Then every-other backup goes to every-other drive. Each backup drive is a stand-alone backup set, and drives can be set aside or stored off site was any time.

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Answer 6

kairos33 Author

Level 1

47 points

Jan 11, 2021 4:51 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Thank you for this!

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Can't delete / empty trash can. Please help

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