Recycle Bin
The Recycle Bin is a page inside tessoa that lists what the system recycle bin currently holds, and lets you restore, permanently delete or empty those items. This page covers how to open it, what you can do there, and where it differs from an ordinary folder.
The Recycle Bin page is available on Windows and macOS. On macOS it lists the system Trash; the entry and menu commands inside tessoa still read Recycle Bin, Restore and Empty Recycle Bin.
Opening the Recycle Bin
- Select the Places page in the sidebar, then click Recycle Bin.
- On Windows, with Replace File Explorer (experimental) enabled, double-clicking the desktop's Recycle Bin icon also lands on this page.
- If the page was open when you last closed tessoa, session restore brings it back.
The breadcrumb reads This PC ▸ Recycle Bin, and Backspace goes up to This PC.
What a row holds
Each row is one item in the recycle bin, shown under the name it had before deletion, followed by a dimmed original location:
| Column | What it holds on this page |
|---|---|
| Name | The file name before deletion, followed by the folder it came from |
| Date Deleted | The recorded deletion time on Windows; on macOS it uses the file's status-change time, which may change if its attributes are modified later in the Trash |
| Size | The recorded or read size for a file; folders show Not calculated |
| Type | Derived from the original file name |
| Folders / Files | Always Not calculated |
Three items all called report.xlsx are told apart by their original location — which doubles as a preview of where Restore will put each one back.
This page has no thumbnails and no preview. Restore an item before viewing its contents. Deleted folders cannot be expanded on this page either.
Trash on macOS
This page reads the Trash in your home folder and on mounted volumes. Items from an external volume are restored to their original volume and folder; disconnecting that volume removes its items from the list.
Some items have no available original-location information. They still appear, but their original location is blank and Restore is greyed out when you right-click one on its own. A mixed selection restores the items whose original locations are known and counts the others as failures.
If tessoa cannot read the Trash in your home folder, this page may be empty or show only accessible items from external volumes. An empty list displays a message pointing to System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access. After granting access, switch to another tab and back to re-read the list; seeing items from an external volume does not mean the home-folder Trash was read successfully.
The three actions
Right-clicking a row, or right-clicking empty space, opens a small menu specific to this page:
| Entry | What it does | Confirmation |
|---|---|---|
| Restore | Puts the selected items back where they came from | None |
| Delete permanently | Wipes the selected items from disk | Shares the confirmation dialog with Delete Permanently |
| Empty Recycle Bin | Wipes every item on this page | Same |
After a restore, a toast reads Restored N items. When something with the same name occupies the original location, the restored copy gets a number appended (report (2).xlsx) and never overwrites an existing file.
Permanent deletion and emptying run in the background, with progress at the top of the window that can be cancelled. Restoring moves an item back to its original location and removes it from this page when complete; a failure is reported in a toast.
On this page, Delete, Shift+Delete and Ctrl+X do nothing. What the Recycle Bin holds is no longer in its original place, so those three keys have nothing to act on and no longer open a confirmation. To delete for real here, use Delete permanently or Empty Recycle Bin from the table above.
The corresponding macOS delete, permanent-delete and cut shortcuts likewise do not act on items on this page.
Deleting permanently and emptying the Recycle Bin cannot be undone. They are the same thing as Shift+Delete: the data leaves the disk, and neither Ctrl+Z nor Activity can bring it back.
What double-clicking does
Nothing opens, and a message appears reading Restore an item before you can open it. To see what is inside, restore it first.
The page also offers no copy, cut, rename or tag entries: those act on a path on disk, and these items are no longer at theirs.
How Activity records it
| Action | Recorded as | Undo on the toast |
|---|---|---|
| Restore | A file operation, not filed under deletions — it brings something back | No |
| Delete permanently / Empty | The same kind as Delete Permanently | No |
Restoring offers no undo button. To delete the item again, return to its original location and perform another deletion.
It does not refresh itself
If another program (File Explorer, for instance) empties the recycle bin, this page does not follow along. Switching to another tab and back re-reads it. Restores and deletions tessoa itself performs here are picked up immediately by any other Recycle Bin page you have open.
File operations · Activity · Install & download · Storage locations