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scoostraw · May 24, 2006, 01:15 PM

Whenever I delete items from my jump drive by dragging them to the trash, the space does not free up. I have to remove the drive and plug it into one of the pc's here. When I do that, I am able to see a .trash folder with all my "deleted" items in it. I delete those and then I am able to proceed normally.

This folder is not visible on the Mac. Why not? Or am I missing something here?

Thanks!

TimmyDee51 · May 24, 2006, 01:22 PM

It's where files go when you drag them to the Trash and don't empty it. That way, whenever you plug your flash drive into your Mac again, you can see the files you dragged in the Trash. It's there as a fail safe so if you accidentally drag something to the Trash and eject the drive before you realize it, your file is still available. The "." in front makes the file invisible to *nix boxen.

SpaceMonkey · May 24, 2006, 01:58 PM

"Trash" is just like the "recycle bin" on Windows. You have to actually empty it before you free any space. To empty it, go to the "Finder" menu and select "Empty Trash..." or right-click on the Trash icon and select "Empty Trash" from the contextual menu.

scoostraw · May 24, 2006, 02:05 PM

Thanks guys. Ok I understand that. Why is the folder not visible though unless I plug the drive into a windows machine?

SpaceMonkey · May 24, 2006, 02:15 PM

Originally Posted by scoostraw

Thanks guys. Ok I understand that. Why is the folder not visible though unless I plug the drive into a windows machine?

Like TimmyDee51 said, the Mac OS X Finder is designed to ignore folders that begin with a period. In this case, it's just to keep the interface consistent, so that when you "move" items to the Trash, they don't still appear in the Finder.

scoostraw · May 24, 2006, 02:32 PM

So in other words - "empty the trash!"... ok I understand.

(Is there any way at all to view this folder on the Mac?)

kick52 · May 24, 2006, 02:38 PM

you can use a menubar app or a utilities to do this. i have a very handy app called mainmenu. it has a maitenance and cleaning tasks and others (like see all files) in the menu bar. google it. its free.

TETENAL · May 24, 2006, 03:01 PM

You can see what's in the trash by clicking the trash icon in the Dock.

Dog Like Nature · May 24, 2006, 03:51 PM

Originally Posted by TETENAL

You can see what's in the trash by clicking the trash icon in the Dock.

Or if you just want to see the Trash on the removable medium, plug it in, switch to Finder, and hit Command-Shift-G, then enter the path. It'll be something like /Volumes/XYZ/.Trash, where XYZ is the name of your removable medium.

Brass · May 24, 2006, 08:39 PM

Originally Posted by scoostraw

Is there any way at all to view this folder on the Mac?

You can (as was posted earlier) use the Finder's "Go" menu and enter the path to the folder you want to view. This command will show the folder's contents in the Finder whether it's hidden or not.

BUT, a much better way of doing it is simply to click on the Trash in the Dock (bottom right, usually). This shows a combined view of what's in the various trash locations (each disk has it's own trash) that's currently accessible by your user account.

The idea is that it's supposed to look like you only have one Trash (ie, the one in the Dock, and which the Finder "Empty Trash" command and "Move to Trash" command work with. In reality this is supported by multiple hidden .trash folders because otherwise the system would have to copy files from one disk to move them to the trash on another disk.

scoostraw · May 25, 2006, 12:25 PM

Thanks guys for all the pointers. I AM paying attention! This is my first Mac. So far I am thrilled with it.