solved Unable to delete personal snippets

[smartishhome]

I am unable to delete personal snippets that I have created.

 

• I attempted to delete a personal snippet that I created in the Snippets section of Features within Alfred Preferences.  I tried to right click and select delete on the line item I wanted to delete as well as highlighting the line item and pressing the minus sign in the bottom right of the section. Either way, I received a notification with the options of cancel and delete.  I selected delete but the snippet was not deleted.  
• I was unsuccessful at deleting the snippet on multiple attempts and after closing Alfred and restarting Alfred.  
• I am attaching a screenshot of the error message I received and eventually noticed. 

"The file "xxxxxxx[xxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxx].json" could not be moved to the trash.  

• Alfred 4.6.4 [1294]
• macOS Monterey Version 12.3

 

Thanks for your help!

[vitor]

Are you syncing your Alfred preferences? If so, which service are you using? Also, can you delete Workflows fine or do those also give you an error?

[smartishhome]

Hi.  Yes, I am syncing Alfred preferences using OneDrive.  I have Files On Demand turned on but have designated the folder containing the synced Alfred preferences (as well as the Alfred preferences file itself) as 'Always Keep on This Device'.  I have been utilizing OneDrive for a couple of years for this purpose and this hasn't been a problem.  For what its worth OneDrive appears to have changed the way it is implemented on Mac fairly recently and I'm not sure what the technical term is but janky is a reasonably accurate way to describe how OneDrive storage is now shown in Finder.

Regarding deleting workflows, yes I can delete workflow at will and without exception.    

[Vero]

@smartishhome OneDrive's latest iteration has moved files to a new location within ~/Library/

 

Could you take a look at the location of your sync folder set in Alfred? It's possible that Alfred is looking at the old location where there might be a OneDrive symlink. If that's the case, change your sync location to the new location of the OneDrive data and see if that solves the issue.

 

Could you keep us updated if it does/doesn't? Might come in handy for other users who have updated OneDrive to this latest version.

[smartishhome]

@Vero That was the problem!  I did as suggested and set the preferences folder to the new location of my OneDrive data and after accepting the notice that Alfred popped up and the quick close and restarting of Alfred I was able to delete the personal snippet just like it used to work.  

 

The OneDrive data is definitely buried in the user Library.  I have enough data stored in OneDrive that it was apparent which folder structure I needed to dig into to reach the relevant directory.  It may be less apparent to users that have less data being synced in OneDrive so the file path below is how I navigated to where I needed to be (which is easier for me to show than to try and put words to it).

 

The following paths both lead back to the same file system object. 

 

So the path that now works correctly is:

/Users/smartishhome/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.OneDriveSyncClientSuite/OneDrive.noindex/OneDrive

 

which equates to the familiar OneDrive folder accessible from the Finder Sidebar (via the button with a Microsoft cloud icon followed by the word OneDrive).  See attached image for reference.  

 

Hopefully, that all makes sense but if it's muddy I'd be happy to clarify further.  

[smartishhome]

FWIW I confirmed the ability to delete a personal snippet on my other mac (it continues to work) that is running Big Sur (11.6.5) and that still syncs the Alfred Preferences from the folder located within

 

/Users/smartishhome/OneDrive

 

So the path change is only required in Monterey it seems.  

 

[Alan He]

 

 

restart alfred and found delete successful.

 

so it's correct as expected?

 

 

## version info

 

- Alfred 4.6.5

- MacOS Monterey 12.2.1

- Sync Used

 

Edited April 11, 2022 by Alan He

[Vero]

@Alan He Your post was merged with the other relevant bug report. In the future, please take a look at the existing bug reports before making a new one, as not only was this already raised, but it was also already answered.

[Alan He]

2 hours ago, Vero said:

@Alan He Your post was merged with the other relevant bug report. In the future, please take a look at the existing bug reports before making a new one, as not only was this already raised, but it was also already answered.

thank you. it's my fault. 

[Alan He]

On 3/30/2022 at 9:34 PM, smartishhome said:

I am unable to delete personal snippets that I have created.

 

• I attempted to delete a personal snippet that I created in the Snippets section of Features within Alfred Preferences.  I tried to right click and select delete on the line item I wanted to delete as well as highlighting the line item and pressing the minus sign in the bottom right of the section. Either way, I received a notification with the options of cancel and delete.  I selected delete but the snippet was not deleted.  
• I was unsuccessful at deleting the snippet on multiple attempts and after closing Alfred and restarting Alfred.  
• I am attaching a screenshot of the error message I received and eventually noticed. 

"The file "xxxxxxx[xxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxx].json" could not be moved to the trash.  

• Alfred 4.6.4 [1294]
• macOS Monterey Version 12.3

 

Thanks for your help!

 

I meet same error.

 

[Alan He]

On 4/1/2022 at 8:13 AM, smartishhome said:

Hi.  Yes, I am syncing Alfred preferences using OneDrive.  I have Files On Demand turned on but have designated the folder containing the synced Alfred preferences (as well as the Alfred preferences file itself) as 'Always Keep on This Device'.  I have been utilizing OneDrive for a couple of years for this purpose and this hasn't been a problem.  For what its worth OneDrive appears to have changed the way it is implemented on Mac fairly recently and I'm not sure what the technical term is but janky is a reasonably accurate way to describe how OneDrive storage is now shown in Finder.

Regarding deleting workflows, yes I can delete workflow at will and without exception.    

 

 

Still not sure how to solve it

 

I decide to use iCloud. 

 

 

and I think it's maybe alfred bug?

 

Alfred should not sync setting-about-sync-loaction. User should decide sync location manualy.

 

 

 

Edited April 12, 2022 by Alan He

[Alan He]

On 4/2/2022 at 5:23 AM, smartishhome said:

@Vero That was the problem!  I did as suggested and set the preferences folder to the new location of my OneDrive data and after accepting the notice that Alfred popped up and the quick close and restarting of Alfred I was able to delete the personal snippet just like it used to work.  

 

The OneDrive data is definitely buried in the user Library.  I have enough data stored in OneDrive that it was apparent which folder structure I needed to dig into to reach the relevant directory.  It may be less apparent to users that have less data being synced in OneDrive so the file path below is how I navigated to where I needed to be (which is easier for me to show than to try and put words to it).

 

The following paths both lead back to the same file system object. 

 

So the path that now works correctly is:

/Users/smartishhome/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.OneDriveSyncClientSuite/OneDrive.noindex/OneDrive

 

which equates to the familiar OneDrive folder accessible from the Finder Sidebar (via the button with a Microsoft cloud icon followed by the word OneDrive).  See attached image for reference.  

 

Hopefully, that all makes sense but if it's muddy I'd be happy to clarify further.  

 

one mac is big sur, another is monterey.

 

error again. you solved?

 

 

 

[Vero]

@Alan He This isn't something we can fix for you; OneDrive is not a supported sync service, so if you're choosing to use it, the tips from Smartishhome should help you resolve the issue.

 

Beyond that, you'll need to either switch to a supported sync service or unsync your preferences.

 

Cheers,
Vero

[smartishhome]

6 hours ago, Alan He said:

 

one mac is big sur, another is monterey.

 

error again. you solved?

 

 

 

Hi Alan - I might be able to clarify how I fixed the issue of not being able to delete personal snippets but I am not sure what you have tried exactly and what exactly is not working.  I see you said you attempted to change the sync from OneDrive to iCloud.  There is a notice to check the Sync help page that states essentially (see image for specific wording) Dropbox is preferred and iCloud and GoogleDrive are known to cause problems.  For those reasons, I did not choose iCloud nor Google.  

 

If you switch back to OneDrive, I found that the sync folder I had been using in Big Sur still worked on the Mac running Big Sur without any change of configuration needed.  The only machine that required me to change the Alfred preferences sync folder location was my Mac running Monterey.   

On 4/1/2022 at 5:23 PM, smartishhome said:

So the path that now works correctly is:

/Users/smartishhome/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.OneDriveSyncClientSuite/OneDrive.noindex/OneDrive

 I don't know that the path that worked on my Monterey machine will work for you but my guess is you could probably get on the right path using the information above.  I just used Finder to find the folder location by navigating down to the root of the hard drive and then clicked on "Users" --> my username --> "Library" --> "Group Containers".  At that point you should look for the folder with ".OneDriveSyncClientSuite" in it (maybe that folder will start with "UBF" but if it doesn't...).  Once you find that then click on "OneDrive.noindex" --> "OneDrive".  Then continue clicking on folders until you get to the location where your Alfred preferences folder is located.   

[Alan He]

 

I found it's OneDrive bug.

 

it us symbolically link on MacOS monterey.

 

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253610921

 

 

 

so if not use old OneDrive App.

 

it can't be solved between multi mac with diff os version

 

Edited April 13, 2022 by Alan He

[Alan He]

@smartishhome

What's your OneDrive Version and MacOS Version.

 

if you solved.

 

 

[Alan He]

so root cause is Alfred not support symbolically link?

[Andrew]

@Alan He if you take a look at @Vero's reply on 1st April in this thread, it gives cause (symlink) and solution (set Alfred sync folder to actual folder location, not via symlink).

[Alan He]

error again @Andrew

Edited April 14, 2022 by Alan He

[smartishhome]

Hi Alan -

On 4/1/2022 at 5:23 PM, smartishhome said:

So the path that now works correctly is:

/Users/smartishhome/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.OneDriveSyncClientSuite/OneDrive.noindex/OneDrive

 

The path I provided earlier (and quoted immediately above) is the path to which the symlink points.  My previous post was unclear as I did not specify that I was referring to 

 

On 4/1/2022 at 4:53 AM, Vero said:

It's possible that Alfred is looking at the old location where there might be a OneDrive symlink. If that's the case, change your sync location to the new location of the OneDrive data and see if that solves the issue.

 

when I said

 

On 4/1/2022 at 5:23 PM, smartishhome said:

@Vero That was the problem!  I did as suggested and set the preferences folder to the new location of my OneDrive data and after accepting the notice that Alfred popped up and the quick close and restarting of Alfred I was able to delete the personal snippet just like it used to work. 

 

Hopefully, with this clarification the thread will make more sense as you go back and read though the entire thread. 

 

2 hours ago, Alan He said:

 

The path you highlighted in the image above is valid in Big Sur and earlier versions which is what I had intended with the following message:

 

On 4/2/2022 at 11:50 PM, smartishhome said:

FWIW I confirmed the ability to delete a personal snippet on my other mac (it continues to work) that is running Big Sur (11.6.5) and that still syncs the Alfred Preferences from the folder located within

 

/Users/smartishhome/OneDrive

 

So the path change is only required in Monterey it seems.