Emptying trash for only certain files?

Is there a way to empty only certain files from the trash without emptying all of the files?

Not without using the UNIX command line or third-party software. If you think you might want to keep something, the only copy of it shouldn't be in the trash.

When a USB jump drive is plugged in, is there a way to empty the trash for just those files and not for the Mac?

See above.

(57371)

Hi Mark,

The trash isn't designed to be a holding bin. Anything you put in Trash you should be certain you want trashed. You might try creating a Desktop folder called "Move to Trash" for that purpose. AFA

If it's a boot=able drive and you're booted from it, you should only see the files in .Trash for that drive.



-mj

Ain't this rich? can't selectively restore (leave it for future), doesn't show where it came from (path), just that it has been part of Windows since at least Vista 4.5 yrs ago.

Also does not allow concurrent operations (not multi-threaded) and can't send multiple deletes at same time to the trash, or, empty at the same time.

Yup, modern OS! 🙂

Ain't this rich? \[...] it has been part of Windows since at least Vista 4.5 yrs ago.

It also doesn't smoke, chew tobacco, drink too much alcohol, pick its nose and wipe the findings on the couch... any number of bad habits aren't supported in Mac OS X. Keeping stuff in the trash that isn't trash is just one of them.

Put the files you want deleted in a folder on the drive other than the Trash, create a new folder in another location with the same name, move the second folder to where the first is, and overwrite its contents.

(57372)

Personally I would would not lose a moments sleep over it.


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Okay, smartaleks... is there really no way to do a selective purge of the Trash bin?

My Aperture library just crashed a week ago. Aperture First Aid won't get past the first step "Examining Library", and I'm trying to create some disk space (hoping that is the problem but I really doubt it) without purging everything that is the trash bin.

This should be a basic function. Of course, as much as I've enjoyed the power of Aperture for the past few months, losing five months worth of versions and edits (I have the originals, but that's a small consolation) -- and the inability to do a basic selective purge of the trash bin -- has me starting to regret the migration away from Windows. If you must know, I'm trying to only purge the video files captured from my miniDV camcorder, as those are fairly easy to recapture but take a boatload of disk space.

Deleting only certain files in the Trash is easy.

1) Locate all files in the Trash that you don't want deleted
2) Move them out of the Trash
3) Empty the Trash

Yeah, that's sorta helpful. Usually we'd say that the software is only as smart as the user of the software, but that's not true for this.

Ideally I could toggle back and forth with certain files (such as ApertureData.xml) in the trash while attempting to rebuild the stupid Aperture database. Now I can only toggle the files back and forth to where ever I copied them out of Trash to.

This is basic functionality that is apparently missing.

Why do you have stuff in the Trash that you want to keep? Files you want to keep should be anywhere but the Trash.

Presumably you have your Aperture library backed up. Why not just restore it from a point before it crashed, instead of going through all of this?

Take a look at [Smart Trash|http://www.hyperbolicsoftware.com/SmartTrash.html].
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Here's one of the screenshots from that page:

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I haven't tried it.

Just make an Automator Service that accepts files and folders in Finder as input and add a run shell script action with this command:

rm "$@"

Set the Pass input as arguments. Save it and name it something like Delete Now!!eleventy. Right-click on the things in the trash and select your command from the Services menu (or it might be directly on the contextual menu if you only have a few Services active).

Nice!

As written, it worked for files but not for folders. To include both, I changed the shell script command to:

rm -R "$@"

This should be a basic function.

No, it should not. Users should NOT be encouraged to keep files in the trash that they are not ready to delete. That is dangerous. They will very easily be lost - it just takes the one right mistaken keypress to delete them all with no confirmation dialog. On top of that, most backup software does not back up anything that is in the trash. Anyone keeping things in the trash that are not definitively trash has a very poorly-thought-out and dangerous workflow that needs to be reconsidered.