How to remove partially downloaded files in 10.6
I could not find any recent helpful answers via Google, but eventually discovered, by trial and error, that you need to delete the failed downloads in three places namely:
/Library/Updates (this is probably unnecessary)
and the *two* files here:-
/private/var/folders/<complicated long path>/<name>
where <name> ends in .pkg and also in .pkg.resumeData (i.e. the "same name" twice)
I found out where these were being saved by (*immediately* after the update-failure), typing
find /private/var/folders -newerct "1 minute ago" -name "*.resumeData"
and sure enough, these corresponded to the failed downloads. I removed them with
sudo rm /private/var/folders/<complicated long path discovered via find/<name>.pgk
sudo rm /private/var/folders/<complicated long path discovered via find/<name>.pgk.resumeData
and then the software update started working again instead of always aborting with e.g. "iTunes: partially downloaded" etc.
The reason for the original failure is my poor internet service that constantly breaks halfway through any long-ish downloads.
An example of the actual filepath on my 10.6.8 Mac OSX is:
/private/var/folders/02/027LjtRMGXSZNggzpqLQg++++TI/-Caches-/com.apple.SoftwareU pdate/swcdn.apple.com/content/downloads/<same amount again in length>
in other words, really long winded and very difficult to find (I have been trying to do this all day and could not find anything via the www) - I hope it helps you!
MacBook, Mac OS X (10.6.8)