Relocated home folder and a non-emptiable trash
Jun 01, '04 10:08:00AM • Contributed by: Anonymous
If your trash refuses to empty and you've already tried all the other hints and tutorials on the web but nothing appears to work, the answer may well be that your home directory is in the wrong location. The Finder will not empty the trash if the home directory is at the root level of the hard disk -- it must be located in the /Users folder. The Finder pretends to empty the trash -- if the Finder is showing a Trash window, then this is closed, but the trash remains full. It's the same for 'Empty Trash' and 'Secure Empty Trash'.
I had added a second hard disk and wanted the whole disk for my home directory. So when I fitted the disk, I set up home to be /ed. Now, months later and after many hours of investigation, I found that moving home to /Users/ed fixed the problem.
[robg adds: This is the first I've heard of this issue -- can anyone else confirm the problem, and/or suggest a fix other than creating a /Users structure?]