I trashed Adobe Acrobat (not Acrobat Reader today) because Adobe screwed up my licensing; their solution was to issue me a new serial number (thanks, guys). Anyhoo, I can't delete all of the Acrobat folder from my trash in OS X, nor can I move it out of the trash (it just copies). Any suggestions? I can't boot from OS 9 because I won't have access to the same trash bin, nor can I login as root for the same reason. I tried Pseudo and was able to get a crack at it, but the permissions won't budge. Help!
Can't delete or move items from trash.
- Thread starter chenly
- Start date
simX
Unofficial Mac Genius
Try doing this: it'll require the Terminal, but I'll try to make it as painless as possible.
Open up the Terminal; it's in the /Applications/Utilities folder. Now, type cd ~/.Trash and press return.
After doing this (there should be no confirmation, it just gives you another prompt), type ls. You should see a listing of all of your files in the trash. If you don't, try using the ls -a command.
If you see all of your files there, then you can delete them via the Terminal. Make sure you are logged in as an administrator. Then type "sudo rm -R " in the Terminal with the trailing space (DON'T press return yet). Now open up your trash in the Finder, select everything you want to delete (I assume that's everything, so just use Command-A), and then drag them to the Terminal window. The Terminal window should fill up with the paths to everything, after what you've already typed in the Terminal window.
Once you do that, just press return, and give it your password. Say goodbye to those stubborn files!
I sure hope that Apple provides a way to delete locked items soon. Maybe like the option-Empty Trash like we had in OS 9.
Open up the Terminal; it's in the /Applications/Utilities folder. Now, type cd ~/.Trash and press return.
After doing this (there should be no confirmation, it just gives you another prompt), type ls. You should see a listing of all of your files in the trash. If you don't, try using the ls -a command.
If you see all of your files there, then you can delete them via the Terminal. Make sure you are logged in as an administrator. Then type "sudo rm -R " in the Terminal with the trailing space (DON'T press return yet). Now open up your trash in the Finder, select everything you want to delete (I assume that's everything, so just use Command-A), and then drag them to the Terminal window. The Terminal window should fill up with the paths to everything, after what you've already typed in the Terminal window.
Once you do that, just press return, and give it your password. Say goodbye to those stubborn files!
I sure hope that Apple provides a way to delete locked items soon. Maybe like the option-Empty Trash like we had in OS 9.
This is odd... I tried to move the undeleteable files to the desktop and to my OS X partition with no avail (the Finder would COPY the files, but not move them out of the Trash), BUT...when I tried to copy them back to their original location on my OS 9 partition, no problem! After that, it was easy to login as the superuser and delete them. Is this a documented UNIX thing, or is it something Apple added to FreeBSD 4.x?
I had a similar problem with my trash ...
Note a few minor things ...
If you cannot find the Trash by "cd ~/.Trash",
then at the Terminal, type "cd .." two or three times and then "ls -sa" until you see Trash at the directory. After that, proceed with simX's directions.
When you type "sudo rm -R " be sure that there is a space after the -R. I hope this helps.
-dw-
Note a few minor things ...
If you cannot find the Trash by "cd ~/.Trash",
then at the Terminal, type "cd .." two or three times and then "ls -sa" until you see Trash at the directory. After that, proceed with simX's directions.
When you type "sudo rm -R " be sure that there is a space after the -R. I hope this helps.
-dw-