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User profile for user: AlbertJim
AlbertJim Author
User level: Level 1
1 points

Messages Beta - Deleting conversations

Has anyone figured out how to delete a message completely in the new Messages Beta?

Send a message to an imessage contact - delete this conversation on all of your ios devices and the folder you have set to save your chat transcripts to (there is no way to not save your conversations in Messages beta like there was in ichat - not good) Ok, now re-message that same contact and all of the old conversation pops back up on the computer only - it is still gone on iphone and ipad. Where else is Messages storing my messages?


Thanks!

Messages Beta-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.7.3)

Posted on Feb 16, 2012 10:05 AM

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38 replies
User profile for user: AlbertJim
AlbertJim Author
User level: Level 1
1 points

Feb 23, 2012 6:53 AM in response to djkeel

Thanks djkeel! That seems to do it for me as well. Looks like specifically the "chat.db" file and "chat.db-wal" files. If you open up those two files in text edit you can see the code and within that the conversation is mixed in. I'm not a programmer but find it kind of funny that each text of my conversation is repeated between 10 - 30 times within the "chat.db-wal" file. Seems like this file would get pretty large after a few months of messaging unless it self purges every so often?


So thanks to djkeel the answer is:


Close Messages Program

Delete the files within User/Library/Messages

Delete the transcripts back up folder

Relaunch Messages Beta

Enjoy, Repeat as necessary 🙂

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User profile for user: RKimmings
RKimmings
User level: Level 1
0 points

Feb 28, 2012 3:15 AM in response to hitmee

Hi,


It seems the folder in question is hidden in Lion - that's probably why you can't locate it...


I use TotalFinder to 'show system files' but there are lots of other ways to show them e.g., http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rpo8Q3vOS0


So then it should show up - Program Drive, Users, (your user account), Library, Messages...


Then delete the 3 files in there..


chat.db
chat.db-shm
chat.db-wal


Hope that helps.

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User profile for user: FundusX
FundusX
User level: Level 1
1 points

Mar 4, 2012 7:13 PM in response to AlbertJim

I just deleted all the messages using the information give by all the above users.

Thanks a lot. You guys are great.


Here's how I did it.


  • First opened the Terminal ( Applications > Utilities >Terminal )
  • Then type the following in the Terminal to show the hidden files

" defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE "

This will show all the hidden files and from on we will start the deleting process

  • Then open the following :- Users > (your admin profile name) > Library > Messages
  • Then delete the following three files

chat.db

chat.db-shm

chat.db-wal


This will delete the messaage logs.


P.S. :- How to hide the hidden files?

Open Terminal and tyle the following

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles FALSE


Thanks to all who took pains to work this out.

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Messages Beta - Deleting conversations

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