This article discusses an issue where Mac OS 9.0.x does not move items from the Temporary Items folder to the Trash if the computer stops responding or "freezes".

Symptom

The amount of available space on your computer's hard disk seems to be dramatically decreasing even though you're not saving any large files on it. This symptom seems to occur especially after the computer stops responding or "freezes" when you are using a graphics application like Photoshop.

Products affected

• Mac OS 9.0 through 9.0.4

1. Open the Script Editor, located in the AppleScript folder of the Apple Extras folder on the hard disk.
2. Copy and paste the AppleScript statements below into the Script Editor window.
3. Choose Save from the File menu and type a filename, such as Temporary Items Cleaner.
4. In the Save As dialog box, choose classic applet from the Format pop-up menu; two additional options appear in the dialog.
Note: If using Mac OS 8.6 or earlier, the Save As dialog reads Application, not classic applet.
5. Click Never Show Startup Screen.
6. Navigate to the Startup Items folder of the System Folder, and click Save.

This creates a small startup applet that works only with the versions of Mac OS 9.0.x that have this condition. It emulates the Finder's expected behavior by creating a folder called Rescued Items in the Trash that will contain any items found in the Temporary Items invisible folder. You can look in this folder for any items you wish to recover, or you can empty the Trash to recover the disk space.

--Begin AppleScript
tell application "Finder" to get the version
set FinderVersion to the result as text
if FinderVersion is less than "9.0" then
display dialog "This AppleScript requires Mac OS 9 or later."¬
with icon stop buttons "OK" default button 1
return
end if

if FinderVersion is less than "9.1" then -- version with problem
tell application "Finder" to set BootVol to name of startup disk
set TmpItems to BootVol & ":Temporary Items:" as text

try
set FolderContents to list folder TmpItems without invisibles
if (count of FolderContents) is 0 then return
on error
return -- probably no folder exists
end try

--Are there Rescued Items folders in the Trash already?
tell application "Finder" to get every item of trash ¬
whose name begins with "Rescued Items"
set RescuedCnt to count of the result
if RescuedCnt is 0 then
set RescuedItemName to "Rescued Items"
else
set RescuedCnt to RescuedCnt + 1
set RescuedItemName to "Rescued Items " & RescuedCnt as text
end if

tell application "Finder"
--Finder cannot create new folders in the trash, so make one
--on the desktop...
make new folder at desktop with properties {name:RescuedItemName}
-- and then move it to the trash
move folder RescuedItemName of desktop to trash
end tell
--construct the rescue target path
set RescuedItemsPath to BootVol & ":Trash:" & RescuedItemName & ":" ¬
as text

repeat with FolderItem in FolderContents
set ItemPath to TmpItems & FolderItem as text
set ItemInfo to info for alias ItemPath
set ItemIsFolder to folder of ItemInfo
if ItemIsFolder then -- It's a folder
set ItemCanBeMoved to true
else -- It's a file
--busy check requires Mac OS 9 Standard Additions
set ItemCanBeMoved to not busy status of ItemInfo
end if
if ItemCanBeMoved then
try
tell application "Finder" to move alias ItemPath to ¬
alias RescuedItemsPath
on error
--something unexpected happened, keep going
end try
end if
end repeat
else
-- probably fixed after this release
end if
--End AppleScript

Note: A compiled version of this AppleScript is available at:

ftp://ftp.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/English-North_American/Macintosh/Misc/AppleScript/Remove_Temp_Items.bin