Trash management - ArchWiki

# Trash management

From ArchWiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.

To prevent accidental deletion of files, you can use a trash can. To ensure compatibility between multiple applications, you can use software (CLI, GUI or Library) that follow the FreeDesktop.org's Trash specification.

Note: Some applications can use a trash can per filesystem (see the specification)
Warning: When deleting files on another filesystem, usage of a trash can induce some latency because the files will be transferred between filesystems. In this case, you might want to use a implementation that create a trash folder per filesystem (See `Trash directories` in the specification).

## Trash creation

This article or section needs expansion.

Reason: Add other utilities (Discuss in Talk:Trash management#)

- glib2 provides a `gio trash [FILE1] [FILE2] ...` command that allows to move files into the trash, while `gio trash --empty` empties the trash
- kde-cli-tools provides a `kioclient5` command that can be used as `kioclient5 move [FILE] trash:/` to move the file FILE to the trash.
- trash-cli — A command-line interface implementing FreeDesktop.org's Trash specification.

  https://github.com/andreafrancia/trash-cli || trash-cli

- bashtrash — Freedesktop-compliant trashcan implemented in bash script

  https://github.com/robrwo/bashtrash/blob/master/trash || bashtrashAUR

- trashman — A Python trash manager

  https://github.com/Kwpolska/trashman || trashmanAUR

- rmtrash — trash-put made compatible to GNUs rm and rmdir

  https://github.com/PhrozenByte/rmtrash || rmtrashAUR

## Trash space usage management

To prevent the trash can from using too much space, you can empty it yourself, or have a pruning policy

### Software list

- autotrash — Tool to automatically purge old trashed files

  https://github.com/bneijt/autotrash || autotrashAUR

### Criteria

This article or section needs expansion.

Reason: Add table with a list of criteria (Discuss in Talk:Trash management#)

- make sure to have at least x MB of free space
- delete files older than x days
- only empty if you have less than x MB of free space (useful in combination of previous criteria)
- maximum trash can size
- file size
- file type
- original path

### Automation

To automate emptying the trash can, you can use cron, systemd/Timers, or inotify (using inotify, only new deletion would trigger the trash can automation)

## Troubleshooting

### Unable to find or create trash directory

#### External drives

`/etc/fstab` might not be set correctly. Note that `ID` must be replaced by your own user id by `$ id`.

    /etc/fstab

    # <device>                                <dir>              <type>    <options>         <dump> <fsck>
    UUID=75667752-8b06-11ea-bc55-0242ac130003 /externalDrive     ntfs-3g   defaults,uid=ID   0      1

Make sure that the root directory of the drive contains `~/.Trash-1000/{expunged,files,info`} and set relevant read permissions for the directory and sub-directory.

Category:

- Lists of software

Hidden category:

- Pages or sections flagged with Template:Expansion