This document relates to deleting .tmp files, not how to clear your browser Internet history or cache.
Note
Windows 98, XP, Vista, 7, 8, and 10
If you are running any of these versions of Windows, we suggest running the Windows Disk Cleanup utility to delete temporary files and cleanup other portions of your computer.
Viewing and deleting temporary files
To view and delete temp files, open the Start menu and type %temp% in the Search field (in Windows XP and prior, click the Run option in the Start menu and type %temp% in the Run field). Press Enter and a Temp folder should open. You can delete all files found in this folder, and if any files are in use, they can be skipped.
After restarting the computer, you should see at least some improvement in the performance of the computer, now that it does not have to load all those temp files.
Searching for .tmp files
If you are running Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT, Windows ME, Windows 2000, or Windows XP, follow the instructions below to search for and delete any .tmp file found on your computer.
Is It Safe To Delete Tmp Files In Windows 7
Once the above steps have been completed, it is also recommended that you ensure the temporary folder on the hard drive is empty by following the steps below.
If you are running MS-DOS or Windows 3.x, follow the instructions below to remove any temporary files currently on the computer.
Which temp files are safe to delete?
Because all temporary files are only a location to hold information temporarily, all temporary files are safe to delete. However, keep in mind that if a file or program is using that file, you may not be able to delete the file.
Unable to delete .tmp file
If you get an error when trying to delete a .tmp file, it is currently being used by Windows or another software program that is running. Close all open programs, restart the computer, and try deleting the file again. If you are still having problems, see the document below.
Additional information
This is something I used to do a lot on Windows, but after my recent fiasco I want to make sure. Is it safe to do
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ripper234
Is It Safe To Delete Tmp Files From My Computer
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6 Answers
In general, no.
If it's filling up with junk, you may want to look at what software isn't cleaning up after itself.
You can also use find to identify files which haven't been modified or accessed in a long time that are probably safe to delete.
RobRob
The real answer is - it depends. /tmp may be used by applications that require lockfiles or temporary logs to be present in order to run, or it may not. There may be symlinks in there..not sure what for, but it's always possible.
You should really look at what is in there before you decide to remove it. doing an rf -rf * on anything is inherently dangerous.
Rory AlsopRory Alsop
No. For example, if you have a MySQL database running on your computer that will kill its socket, or if you are using emacs as a server that will kill the server process. There are many other cases where it is not safe to remove these files. The best thing to do is to write a script which checks the date of the file and only removes it if it is old.
delete
Can Burak ÇilingirCan Burak Çilingir
No.
But you could a ramdisk for the /tmp dir then it would be empty after every reboot of the system. And as a side effect your system may become a little big faster.
Google has a lot on info on tmpfs and/or ramfs.
JohanJohan
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My suggestion is to rename your tmp folder first to see what's being affected by this directory. Rename it from 'tmp' to 'old_tmp'. Also, create a new empty folder with name 'tmp' because may some setup or system process require this folder to create some files inside this directory like log files. Follow these steps for secure removing of tmp date.
1- Rename existing 'tmp' directory as 'old_tmp'.2- Create new empty 'tmp' directory3- Assign all permission as '0777' to this newly created directory so the system/setup can have permission to create/place log and other files inside this directory.4- Run system and applications to make sure everything is running fine and behaving as usual. Keep in observation for 2-3 days.5- If sure nothing is affected due to renaming your 'tmp' directory to 'old_tmp' then you can delete 'old_tmp' directory.
Note: If anything causing issue's due to renaming 'tmp' directory to 'old_tmp' then let this directory back to its original 'tmp' name.
A.Aleem11A.Aleem11
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If you’re looking to free space or just simply clean off the clutter on the hard drive of your Microsoft Windows 10 computer, here is a list of file and folder locations you can safely remove to clear the most space.
Windows Temp Folders
Applications use these folders to temporarily write data. You can safely remove anything in the folder, but you may not be able to delete items that are in use.
Likely safe locations to delete files and folders from:
Browser Temp Folders
Data from web pages. Cached to make loading time quicker.
Likely safe locations to delete files and folders from:
Log Files
Files that store data about what certain applications did.
Likely safe locations to delete ONLY FILES THAT END IN “.LOG”.
Normally it’s safe to delete all files and folders in this location:
Old Prefetch Data
Data Windows uses to open commonly used programs faster.
Likely safe locations to delete files and folders from:
Crash Dumps
Files containing data about what was in memory when applications crash.
Likely safe locations to delete files and folders from:
Surely, I don’t know it all. Others may have locations they regularly clear to free hard drive space in Windows 10. If you have a location you know about, please share it in the comments section.
One really easy way to free up some disk space in Windows is to delete temporary files, sometimes referred to as temp files. Temp files are exactly what they probably sound like: files that your operating system only needed to exist temporarily while in use, but are now just wasting space.
Most temporary files are stored in what's the called the Windows Temp folder, the location of which differs from computer to computer, and even user to user. The steps for that are below.
Manually cleaning out the Temp folder in Windows usually takes less than a minute but it could take longer depending on how large the collection of temporary files is.
You can delete temp files in the way outlined below in any version of Windows, including Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP.
How to Delete Temporary Files in Windows
Follow these simple steps to delete your temporary Windows files:
Confirm that you want to delete the items, which will permanently remove those temporary files from your computer.
The next time you delete temporary files in Windows, feel free to hold down Shift as you delete the files. It's a trick that will skip over storing them in Recycle Bin, essentially 'permanently' deleting them and saving you this last step.
You now, in the short term, have an empty temporary files section.
Using a Command Line Command
The steps shown above are considered the normal way to delete temporary files, but you, of course, have to do that manually. If you'd rather, you can build your own mini program that can delete these temp files automatically with a simple double-click/tap of a BAT file.
You can do this using the rd (remove directory) Command Prompt command to delete the entire folder and all of the subfolders.
Type the following command into Notepad or some other text editor, and save it with the .BAT file extension:
The q parameter suppresses confirmation prompts to delete the files and folders, and s is for deleting all the subfolders and files in the temp folder.
If the %temp% environment variable is for some reason not working, feel free to substitute in the actual folder location mentioned in Step 2 above, but make sure you type the correct folder path, and to be safe, surround the path in quotes like this:
Other Types of Temporary Files in Windows
The Windows Temp folder isn't the only place that temporary files, and other no-longer-needed groups of files, are stored on Windows computers.
The Temp folder that you found in Step 2 above is where you'll find some of the operating-system-created temporary files in Windows, but the C:WindowsTemp folder contains a number of additional files that you no longer need to keep.
Feel free to open that Temp folder and delete anything you find in there.
Ultimate custom night download free full. Your browser also keeps temporary files, usually in an attempt to speed up your browsing by loading cached versions of web pages when you revisit them. See How to Clear Your Browser's Cache for help deleting these types of temporary files.
Other, harder-to-find locations contain temporary files, too. Disk Cleanup, a utility included in all versions of Windows, can help remove the contents of some of those other temp folders for you automatically. You can open that in a Run dialog box (WIN+R) via the cleanmgr command.
Dedicated 'system cleaners' like the free CCleaner program can make this, and similar jobs, really easy. Many free computer cleaner programs exist to choose from, too, including Wise Disk Cleaner and Baidu PC Faster.
Check how much free space your hard drive has, both before and after you delete temporary files, to see how much space you recovered.
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