I did a ful wipe & load with Mavericks, and since day one, the Trash icon doesn't change when files go in. If I right click, all I can do is Open and see the files there. The only way I can empty the Trash is by using this command in Terminal: rm -rf ~/.Trash/*
Files are definitely there, I can see them if I open the Trash. Any ideas?
MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7)
This seems like a common problem, but searches pull up many Trash related problems but not particularly this problem. Does anyone know what's wrong with my Trash?
Check the permissions on the Trash?
ls -la ~/.Trash/
(that's a lowercase L)
Mine is -->
total 0
drwx------ 2 drew staff 68 7 Nov 19:38 .
drwxr-xr-x@ 84 drew staff 2856 10 Nov 01:11 ..
I'd consider deleting it & rebooting but that feels brutal 🙂
(note the absence of the final slash)
rm -rf ~/.Trash
I'd then move on to resetting permissions on the home directories Do you know how to do this in recovery mode via the 'resetpassword' utility?
This is what I'm seeing:
drwx------ 3 greg staff 102 Nov 10 13:16 .
drwxr-xr-x+ 22 greg staff 748 Oct 26 12:28 ..
-rw-r--r--@ 1 greg staff 15364 Nov 10 07:39 .DS_Store
For the first time, I set up this install to use a non-admin account. I authorize with the admin password whenever I need to install anything. That's the only thing I can think of that's different.
I do not know how to boot to recovery mode and resetting permissions. I did do the "verify permissions" in Disk Utility but that didn't fix anything.
Those permissions look normal, I don't know if this next part will have any effect…
Boot holding cmd+R. Recovery mode should startup (assuming you have a recovery partition).
Select Terminal from the list of options (from the Utilities menu).
Enter the word
resetpassword
& hit return.
The GUI app will open, select the boot HD.
Select your user account in the popup menu.
Then click the Reset button at the bottom right. It will "Reset Home Folder Permissions & ACL's"
Repeat for other users.
Quit ResetPassword from the menu
Quit Terminal
You can also select Disk Utility and repair the system permissions.
Select the Disk (the top level item), repair it.
Select the boot volume (below the disk) and repair disk permissions. Note: Some permissions errors are normal and won't ever disappear.
Seeing this as well. I installed Araxis Find Duplicate Files today and did a lot of house cleaning. I wonder if that has anything to do with it?
That might depend on if you decided to 'clean' critical system files?
I wonder if you purged the icons…
Open this via the Finders "Go menu > Go to Folder…"
/System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/Resources/
Compare to the selected items in this picture
Thanks for that thoughtful and very complete answer. I didn't touch the boot disk or system folder, just various other hard drives. I do music and sound production and have many TBs of sounds and projects that tend to get duplicated (copies of SFX, etc.
But I did check the package you mentioned and it's identical. I also restarted (logging in/out had no effect on the problem) and the trash icons are working correctly again.
Thanks again for the information. It's always nice to learn something new about the inner workings of the OS and file structures.
Best,
mm
I'm seeing the same icon files in that folder you mentioned. I don't think it's an icon issue, because even when I see files in the Trash, I still can't right click and empty the Trash. It just always looks like and acts like there are no files in it, and the only way I can empty is with the terminal command.
Please read this whole message before doing anything.
I've never really understood the logic behind these pre-fabricated responses. Checking the posters message history you see an array of prepared responses and lots of (apparently) cut and paste, one-size-fits-all procedures that are clearly not thought out for the specific problem at hand. Just an attempt, perhaps, to have the highest post count possible. I've gotten these several times before and they are counter-productive, asking members here with problems to jump thru hoops that are not going to solve, nor get at the root of, the issues presented.
It's not the quantity of your posts, it's the quality of your posts that should be considered. I wish Apple would implement a system where identical posts in different threads were treated as one post and not artificially inflate those posting above their actual knowledge level or their actual helpfulness. Copy/paste posts are just one step below spam, IMO, and less productive in terms of actually helping anyone.
Interesting, I didn't even realize that's what this was until your post. I re-read the post you replied to and there is no mention of my problem. Simply "reboot into safe mode and see if your problem still exists." Very generic. Guess I won't waste my time trying his method.
I do wish someone had a sound solution to my problem. A clean install of Mavericks shouldn't cause my Trash to go haywire. Granted I do have a SSD/HDD solution, but still...
Maybe somebody could just help me write a script that runs the terminal command, so that I can at least click an icon to empty the trash? I'm about ready to just accept my Trash is broken than spend much more time and effort trying to get it fixed. I work with Windows PCs at work and deal with problems daily. I bought a Mac because I wanted everthing to "just work."
Maybe you are right Michael Mortilla, or maybe it is years of troubleshooting experience that has been combined into a way to try to help more than one person.
There is nothing generic about asking a user to boot to safe mode. It is a tried & trusted way to isolate the OS from 3rd party extensions & startup items.
It seems tiresome & inefficient to write out the exact same safe mode instructions for every post. If you miss a critical point you spend the next 3 posts trying to extract the info from a user.
Ignore the canned responses if you like, but they do contain relevant & well honed info sometimes.
groberts1980 wrote:
Interesting, I didn't even realize that's what this was until your post. I re-read the post you replied to and there is no mention of my problem. Simply "reboot into safe mode and see if your problem still exists." Very generic. Guess I won't waste my time trying his method.
I do wish someone had a sound solution to my problem. A clean install of Mavericks shouldn't cause my Trash to go haywire. Granted I do have a SSD/HDD solution, but still...
Sorry this isn't Yo Sushi. Fixes are not delivered on a plate. You need to test & follow advice to get to the bottom of complicated issues. If you are lucky we can point to a fix (assuming we have seen one). Otherwise it's a process of elimination. Every Mac becomes unique when you start adding apps & tweaks.
Safe mode is a real test that can help understand if the system is at fault or if it is third party extensions.
Ignore safe mode as a test step at your own peril!
Michael Mortilla, would you consider offering your expert advice to actually help groberts1980, instead of getting him to ignore perfectly valid advice?
Fair enough! I will try the safe mode test as soon as I get home.
Perhaps, but they also have the effect of making people chase their tail in a procedure that often has no relation to the problem. I don't have a high post count, but I've been computing since 1986 on multiple platforms and have a lot of experience in troubleshooting, especially on a Mac. I usually tell the Apple Store Geniuses where they are going in the wrong direction, even the escalated calls to tech support level 2.
I suppose if you are a newbie or really a novice or just plain ignorant, the prepared remarks might make you feel better, but in general, they are fairly useless in most instances and no more helpful in deeper problems like this one than sscripting at the call center is at most software compaines.
Trash Icon Not Changing, Can Only Empty Using Terminal
