Alternative to secure empty trash?

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Alternative to secure empty trash?

I've just recently had to rebuild my desktop after a cable failure ruined my back-up hard drive. In the process, I ended up with duplicate user profiles (and all related preferences and data). I moved the duplicates to my trash.

Is there a way to completely remove them now other than secure empty trash? I ask because after 4 days of continuous file deletion in secure empty trash, when it got to the last file, it crashed. When I rebooted, the trash was still full & nothing had been deleted.

(Sure hope that made sense.)

Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on Apr 28, 2013 8:08 AM

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Answer 1

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macjack

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Apr 28, 2013 8:51 AM in response to Meggity

Go to /Applications /Utilities/Terminal and launch it.

At the prompt, copy and paste this command

sudo rm -rf ~/.Trash

Press Return.

You will be asked to enter your admin password. It will be invisible.

Enter it and press Return.

Log out and back in or restart.

Let us know.

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Answer 2

Meggity Author

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Apr 28, 2013 9:05 AM in response to macjack

Thanks, macjack! I'll try it. But first, can you let explain what this is doing (i know, it's answering my question - ha! - , but I mean can you explain technically what this command is telling the system to do.)?

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Answer 3

Apr 28, 2013 9:41 AM in response to Meggity

~/.Trash

is the folder that the Trash bin, you see on the Dock, uses to preserve documents when you trash them.

~ is your home directory

/ is a path separator

.Trash is the folder name

So, the command tells OSX to remove (rm), recursively without asking for confirmation (-rf), that folder and all of its content.

I will suggest to modify the command like this

sudo rm -rf ~/.Trash/*

remove only the content but preserve the .Trash folder

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Answer 4

Meggity Author

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Apr 28, 2013 12:56 PM in response to Alberto Ravasio

Alberto - I did as you suggested and several individual files were deleted. Thank you!

However, there are several backup folders from the external harddrive that had been removed to the trash that were not deleted by the sudo rm - rf ~/.Trash/* command.

Any thoughts on that? Or maybe I should be asking how backups from an external hard drive can be deleted without moving them to the desktop trash folder. Perhaps I can move them back on to the external drive from the trash and deleted them while still on the drive?

Clueless......

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Answer 5

Apr 28, 2013 1:19 PM in response to Meggity

Sorry but I didn't understand.

Do you mean, you see the Trash bin still full after the Terminal command?

Is the external hard drive connected?

If so, what about the Trash bin icon if you disconnect the external drive?

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Answer 6

Meggity Author

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Apr 28, 2013 3:04 PM in response to Alberto Ravasio

Aha. Yes, the trash can bin is empty when I disconnect the external drive and shows it's full when it's plugged back in. Thank you.

So, now, how do I securely erase files from my external drive trash?

(Hope this is my last question)

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Answer 7

Apr 28, 2013 3:10 PM in response to Meggity

What is the name of the external volume?

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Answer 8

Meggity Author

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Apr 28, 2013 3:11 PM in response to Alberto Ravasio

It's in 3 partitions: Laptop, New Desktop and Desktop. The backup files that are showing up in the trash are from "Desktop."

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Answer 9

Apr 28, 2013 3:19 PM in response to Meggity

Open Terminal and issue

rm -Rf /Volumes/Desktop/.Trashes/*

hit return. If you don't see the Trash bin empty, click on it. It will become empty.

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Answer 10

Meggity Author

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Apr 28, 2013 3:31 PM in response to Alberto Ravasio

That did not work. Could it be that there are two sets of backups on that one partition? i.e., there's a backup called "[My name]'s iMac G5 (2)" (which is where the files were deleted from) and another one called "MHRdesktop's iMac"? Or should I maybe have inserted a tilde (~) before the /Volumes?

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