Trash Problem in OS X

[mc68k]

Whenever I try to empty my trash, I get an error message saying:

"The operation cannot be permitted because you do not have sufficient privileges for '501'".

I click Continue on that then I get this one:

"The operation cannot be completed because you do not have sufficient privileges for some of the items."

I have administrator privileges and I get these messages no matter what I trash, even empty folders. After the I click Continue on both of the messages, whatever I have in the trash can is erased.

I was wondering if anyone here knows what might be causing these messages and/or how to fix them.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Falleron]

I have similar problems with privaledges. I am logged in as an administrator as well. I have lots of files I want to delete or move but cant!

 

[mc68k]

Originally posted by Falleron
I have similar problems with privaledges. I am logged in as an administrator as well. I have lots of files I want to delete or move but cant!

You can log in as root, if you have that account enabled, to delete/move anything you want.

I'm just pissed that I can't delete anything without having to go through two sets of dialog boxes in my own everyday acct. This problem went away once unexpilcably, then it came back.

 

[Falleron]

My problem started when part of Entourage corrupted. Office, entourage + IE all stopped working. The only way I could get everything working was to create a new user + start again. The only problem is that the older files from the previous user account must be set for that user only. Its not a large problem for me but it would be nice to get it sorted. I do have the root account enabled but tend to go back to OS9 to delete the unwanted files.

 

[jelloshotsrule]

this issue could be another thing that keeps people with using os 9 in some small capacity...

usually after i restart (in x) i can trash the things i need to, but not always. it would be a good thing to clear up for the future... ie, make it easier to fix from within os x.

 

[mc68k]

It's not that I can't trash the items, it's the fact that I have to click through multiple dialog boxes EVERY time just to delete ANYTHING— even empty folders. The items do get trashed though.

Sometimes things can't be trashed/moved because of legitimate access privleges. But my problem stems from this message appearing when it's not SUPPOSED to. The messages I'm getting are reserved for privelege problems when in fact I don't have any.

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
this issue could be another thing that keeps people with using os 9 in some small capacity...

OS 9 is a single-user OS that is a variant of the Multifinder invented in the 80's. I like OS X because it's truly new. It may bring with it some new challenges like access privleges, but all in all it's a MUCH better OS. People keep using OS 9 because they don't want to change. They usally find little things wrong with OS X to support their using 9 when oin fact X is light-years ahead. People will have to adopt it in the future though.

 

[Falleron]

I totally agree with you. I use OSX about 95% of the time & will remove OS9 completely when my scanning software appears. I really dont like using OS9 anymore!

 

[mc68k]

Originally posted by Falleron
I totally agree with you. I use OSX about 95% of the time & will remove OS9 completely when my scanning software appears. I really dont like using OS9 anymore!

Amen. I just use 9 when I want something to run FAST. Like when I'm just going to browse the internet, IE 5.1 under 9 will blow away ANY internet browser under X. I can even make a RAM Disk to stroe my cache so that nothing gets written to disk! X can't offer me that.

The only real thing I have aginst X is the Aqua overhead taking up all my resources. With my hand-tuned 9.2.2, apps are so zippy, you'd think I have a new computer.

 

[Falleron]

I have a new dual 1ghz powermac with 1gig of ram so I have not seen any performance problems (apart from window resizing). Guess I am lucky that I got a great computer that is really well suited to OSX.

 

[Rower_CPU]

Originally posted by mc68k
You can log in as root, if you have that account enabled, to delete/move anything you want.

I'm just pissed that I can't delete anything without having to go through two sets of dialog boxes in my own everyday acct. This problem went away once unexpilcably, then it came back.

Well there's a couple of possibilities:
1) Your unsupported utility might have a couple of bugs in it
or,
2) You might have a corrupted plist file hanging around

Did you do anything special to get the problem to go away last time, or did it just clear itself up?

 

[mc68k]

Originally posted by Falleron
I have a new dual 1ghz powermac with 1gig of ram so I have not seen any performance problems (apart from window resizing). Guess I am lucky that I got a great computer that is really well suited to OSX.

It's just sad that you have to get such a great expensive machine to see the full benefits of the OS. A plethora of machines can run OS 9 REAL fast, but only a handful can be said to do the same thing with X.

 

[mc68k]

Originally posted by Rower_CPU


Well there's a couple of possibilities:
1) Your unsupported utility might have a couple of bugs in it
or,
2) You might have a corrupted plist file hanging around

Did you do anything special to get the problem to go away last time, or did it just clear itself up?

Plist file, you say? Could I get more info on that?

It's not the UUX because that just twaeks with low-level stuff like NVRAM and OF. It just gets the beast known as OS X to launch, then the rest is history.

Yeah, last time I think I logged into Aqua with my superuser acct and did some funny stuff that I thought might help, and it did. But no luck this time.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Rower_CPU]

Originally posted by mc68k
Plist file, you say? Could I get more info on that?

Yeah, last time I think I logged into Aqua with my superuser acct and did some funny stuff that I thought might help, and it did. But no luck this time.

Thanks in advance.

The plist files in OS X are the equivalent of the preference files in OS 9. They are XML based files that store the settings for the various apps/core services. If you look in either /Library/Preferences or ~user/Library/Preferences you will see a multitude of files with a .plist extension.

I'm guessing your's might be the one for the Finder, called com.apple.finder.plist. Troubleshooting is the same as in OS 9: trash it, restart/log out and see if it fixed it.

 

[xlemming]

trash issues

you can't delete certain file except in root mode because that is the way unix is set up. Administrators get certain privileges, as do the root users, basic users, and user groups. You can change the file permissions on the files but looking in the info. One note if you don't "own" the file you can't change the permissions.

I have my own problem: when i drag something to the trash it says that the file will be deleted immediately and then asks me whether or not i want to delete it. Does anyone know how to fix this so i can have a normal trash can?

 

[Rower_CPU]

Re: trash issues

Originally posted by xlemming
I have my own problem: when i drag something to the trash it says that the file will be deleted immediately and then asks me whether or not i want to delete it. Does anyone know how to fix this so i can have a normal trash can?

You can find the option to turn off the empty Trash warning dialog in the Finder's preferences.

 

[mc68k]

Still a no go..

Originally posted by Rower_CPU

I'm guessing your's might be the one for the Finder, called com.apple.finder.plist. Troubleshooting is the same as in OS 9: trash it, restart/log out and see if it fixed it.

Trashed all the com.apple.x plist files in my user library after I backed them up. No change. Any other suggestions? Maybe where files with a influence on trash attributes are located?

 

[Rower_CPU]

Re: Still a no go..

Originally posted by mc68k
Trashed all the com.apple.x plist files in my user library after I backed them up. No change. Any other suggestions? Maybe where files with a influence on trash attributes are located?

Hmmm...you can go ahead and do the same with the ones at the System level. It seems to me that the Finder is in charge of handling the trash, so anything related to that should affect it. You might want to check and see if you have some dot files floating around in the Trash that are messing things up. Check via the Terminal.

 

[mc68k]

FIXED!!

Seemed to be a .DS_Store file in the .Trash hidden subdirectory, that holds trash items before you delete them.

So I guess this was hidden so that I could not see it, but the OS still wanted to delete it. That's why I was getting the pre-emptive error messages, but still able to delete whatever I put in there.

I don't know how that file got in there, but now that it's gone, my trash emptys just fine.

Thanks for all the help!!

 

[Rower_CPU]

Re: FIXED!!

Originally posted by mc68k
Seemed to be a .DS_Store file in the .Trash hidden subdirectory, that holds trash items before you delete them.

So I guess this was hidden so that I could not see it, but the OS still wanted to delete it. That's why I was getting the pre-emptive error messages, but still able to delete whatever I put in there.

I don't know how that file got in there, but now that it's gone, my trash emptys just fine.

Thanks for all the help!!

Excellent. Glad to help out!

 

[xlemming]

hey thanks for the reply.

I wish my problem was that simple. I don't mind the confirmation, but when I put something in the trash it is automatically deleted. I can't hold anything in the trash. Has anyone else ever had a problem like this?

 

[Rower_CPU]

Originally posted by xlemming
hey thanks for the reply.

I wish my problem was that simple. I don't mind the confirmation, but when I put something in the trash it is automatically deleted. I can't hold anything in the trash. Has anyone else ever had a problem like this?

I've never heard of anything like that before. You might try following some of the same procedures that I gave for mc68k. Good luck!

 

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by mc68k
OS 9 is a single-user OS that is a variant of the Multifinder invented in the 80's. I like OS X because it's truly new. It may bring with it some new challenges like access privleges, but all in all it's a MUCH better OS. People keep using OS 9 because they don't want to change. They usally find little things wrong with OS X to support their using 9 when oin fact X is light-years ahead. People will have to adopt it in the future though.

oh, don't get me wrong. i much prefer os x, and i used it almost exclusively...

but as has been said by a few people over various other topics, there are still just a few things holding people back from os x, not from switching in general, but from totally getting rid of 9 from their comp.

now that most of the big apps have been ported, there are just some other little issues. just posing the idea that for some less well versed users, os 9 may be kept around to deal with privilege issues. not forever of course, but for a bit longer than perhaps would have been otherwise.

but yeah, i agree. i think it's better, i've changed, etc etc.

 

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by xlemming
I wish my problem was that simple. I don't mind the confirmation, but when I put something in the trash it is automatically deleted. I can't hold anything in the trash. Has anyone else ever had a problem like this?

funny thing is, that just happened to me about an hour ago. just for one file and i didn't really care or anything.

i think i've seen it before, but have never had a "problem" with it per se...

let us know if you find something that works. seems like following rower's suggestions could work...

 

[mc68k]

Originally posted by xlemming
hey thanks for the reply.

I wish my problem was that simple. I don't mind the confirmation, but when I put something in the trash it is automatically deleted. I can't hold anything in the trash. Has anyone else ever had a problem like this?

I agree with Rower'— that's a strange error. What does it say? Or do you even get an error message before it deletes your files?

The only time I get a message like that is when I'm deleting something from a remote volume, but I haven't had that problem on a local volume.

Let us know more info as you get it.

 

[xlemming]

what I did to create this is somewhat of a strange story:

I wanted to make a new user, but keep the same preference files and the same name. (I did this because I had a problem with internet connect and using another user solved this) So a made a new user with a different name and copied over all the important prefernce files, then I went into the root user mode and deleted the first user allocating the all that user's files to my new user, and then I went into netinfo manager to change the name of my new user because it would not allow me to change the name. I now have an identical user as the one before in every way except for this trash problem.