Sign in
Microsoft.com
 
Microsoft
 
 
 

locked
How to clear recycle bins - My Recycle Bins sure *look* empty but.. RRS feed

 > 

  • Question

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
     When I look at the folder properties, some of my WHS Recycle Bins have as much as 16GB in them. But when I open the folder, no files show up. I thought it might have just been my settings in the "view" tab of "folder options". However, I've checked them and they appear to be correct (set to show hidden files and folders). I've attached a screenshot of the settings that I think control what files I see.

    I'm thinking I'm just missing something very basic about WHS and how it uses Recycling Bins. For example, I notice "Empty Recycle Bin" is greyed out on all RB context menus (screenshot attached). Can I not manually empty recycle bins or at least delete some of the recycled files that I want out of my life forever?

    Here's why I care about this: I'm running backups of my server to a USB drive. The backup log is littered with "failed to process <WHS share name>/$RECYCLE.BIN/<subfolder/file name>" entries. There can be hundreds, if not thousands of these entries which makes it hard for me to determine if my backup failed on important (non-RB) files. Call me a neat freak but I like clean backup logs smile.gif

    On a related note: I see similar messages in the sync log of a client's computer that is attempting to run client side cache file copies (aka CSC or offline files).

    Ideally, I'd like to understand if and/or how I can interact with the contents of WHS's recycle bins. If that's not possible, I'd like to find a way to exclude RB contents from being processed by server backups (backups of WHS shares not client backups). Similarly, I'd like to be able to setup offline files so that a share can be available offline on a client but NOT the recycle bin contents so I can avoid all those pesky sync errors.

    Thanks in advance for any wisdom anyone can share!  

    <I'm having trouble posting my screenshots.  I'm happy to email them to you if you'd like to see them>

    Chris J
    • Edited by Jeffreez Thursday, October 30, 2008 4:38 PM
    Thursday, October 30, 2008 4:34 PM

Answers

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Nope - nothing of consequence in the client RBs.  BTW - I use the same setup - My Docs on my client PCs are mapped to the /users/<username> on my WHS. 

    I feel kinda stupid because I think I've found a solution to my problem.  I had been trying to either empty the RB in each folder on my server (this didn't work because "empty recycle bin" was greyed out) or delete the contents of the folder (this didn't work because no files were listed inside the folder).  I decided to delete the actual RB in one of the folders with the described behavior (i.e. big RB size but no files listed) and this seemed to have fixed the problem.  The space has been cleared.  Let's hope this won't have any dreadful side-effects. 

    Thanks to everyone for their responses. 
    Chris J
    Monday, December 15, 2008 5:09 PM

All replies

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Windows file sharing doesn't use the Recycle Bin (on the client or the server) when a file is deleted, so if there are files in your recycle bin, they probably got there because someone deleted them manually. Do you have any software other than WHS installed on your server? Any add-ins? Which ones? Any softwre installed from the desktop? What? Are you in the habit of logging in to your server regularly using remote desktop or a physically attached keyboard, video, and mouse? For what purposes?
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Thursday, October 30, 2008 6:58 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Ken - thanks for the reply.  I don't have KVM installed on my server but I do use RDP a bit, just to do stuff that I can't do via the WHS console app on a client PC.  In my mind, I don't do a whole bunch on the server-proper - I have been cleaning up files (or trying to) which may be some of the manual deletes you mention. 

    The only thing I have installed on the server other than add-ins (remote notification, PerfectDisk, Avast, KeepVault) is iTunes.  I have only used it a couple of times, though. 

    So what I hear you saying is my recycle bin should be empty - it would only have stuff in it if I manually deleted files on the WHS itself.  I now have 15GB in the recycle bin folder - how can I get rid of that stuff? 
    Chris J
    Saturday, November 29, 2008 8:46 PM
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Chris,

    Have you tried using Windows Explorer in an RDP session to your server, to check and delete the Recycle Bin contents? It should show everything that's been deleted manually, but as Ken says, a Server doesn't utilise the recycle bin at all. Also, backups of WHS Shared Folders doesn't (or shouldn't) include any recycle bin, only the actual folders and their contents.

    Colin
    If anyone answers your query successfully, please mark it as 'Helpful', to guide other users.
    Saturday, November 29, 2008 8:57 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Hi Chris,
    Windows itself puts recycle bins never into a subfolder, only into the root of the physical drives.
    Maybe these recycle bins have been created from a 3rd party application which you run on your client PCs (i.e. some media player application, I think I have read about a similar issue before). If you check the contents of these recycle bins more carefully, can you recognize, what kind of files are stored there and which application may be the source?

    Best greetings from Germany
    Olaf
    Sunday, November 30, 2008 8:29 AM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Colin and Olaf - thanks for your responses.  Sorry for the silence on my end.  Apparently, my subscription to this thread isn't working because I didn't get an email saying you had responsed.  

    When I RDP into the server (that's really the only way I can access it since I don't have a video card in the server), I see "Recycle Bin" folders in several folders.  In particular, in my user folder (e.g. /user/cjeffries), the folder properties show this folder as having 17.9GB in it but when I open it, there are no files listed.  Ditto for my Music share - the RB is shown at 2.5GB but no files are visible inside the folder.  Ditto for Photos - 3GB but no files.  No RB folders in Software or Video shares. 

    Could iTunes be the culprit?  I use it fairly heavily on a client PC to manage music and photos (which might explain the RB folders in those shares but that doesn't explain the one in my user folder)

    To me, it comes down to this - how can I reclaim this space?  The "empty recycle bin" context menu option is greyed out on all the RBs. 

    Thanks in advance for any help anyone can offer. 
    Chris J
    Wednesday, December 10, 2008 9:24 PM
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Just a thought: do you map drives to your shares, or do you access them using UNC paths?
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Wednesday, December 10, 2008 10:41 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Whenever possible, I use UNCs although I'm sure I've mapped drives at some point. 
    Chris J
    Wednesday, December 10, 2008 10:46 PM
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    I have seen an issue where software creates a recycle bin in a mapped drive, but it was a long time ago. If memory serves, there is no way to remove it because it doesn't actually exist. On the bright side, if memory serves no space is actually taken up by these phantom recycle bins. They may report they're taking up XX MB or GB of space, but nothing is actually consumed.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Wednesday, December 10, 2008 11:24 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Ken Warren said:

    I have seen an issue where software creates a recycle bin in a mapped drive, but it was a long time ago. If memory serves, there is no way to remove it because it doesn't actually exist. On the bright side, if memory serves no space is actually taken up by these phantom recycle bins. They may report they're taking up XX MB or GB of space, but nothing is actually consumed.

    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)



    Just out of curiosity, do you have anything in your Recycle Bin on your client(s)?  I had a similar issue where I work.  We "map" (actually it's link) everyone's My Documents to our server (for redundancy and backup purposes).  We recently received new servers, but when I re-linked everyone's documents to the new server, there were issues (for a few different reasons).  One of them was because people had "deleted" files from their My Documents, which would normally send it to the Recycle Bin.  However, the Recycle Bin doesn't really exist because their My Documents isn't on the local hard drive.  I had to go through their Recycle Bin and either A) delete the individual files or B) just empty the entire Recycle Bin on the local machine.
    Thursday, December 11, 2008 4:17 AM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Nope - nothing of consequence in the client RBs.  BTW - I use the same setup - My Docs on my client PCs are mapped to the /users/<username> on my WHS. 

    I feel kinda stupid because I think I've found a solution to my problem.  I had been trying to either empty the RB in each folder on my server (this didn't work because "empty recycle bin" was greyed out) or delete the contents of the folder (this didn't work because no files were listed inside the folder).  I decided to delete the actual RB in one of the folders with the described behavior (i.e. big RB size but no files listed) and this seemed to have fixed the problem.  The space has been cleared.  Let's hope this won't have any dreadful side-effects. 

    Thanks to everyone for their responses. 
    Chris J
    Monday, December 15, 2008 5:09 PM