How to shred an alias
on Mac OS 8, Mac OS 9 using ShredIt

This type of function is called interchangeably "shred file", "erase file", "wipe file, or "secure delete file". more info


Don't just shred an alias in the usual way. Here's why.

When you shred an alias, ShredIt shreds the file the alias points to, not the alias file itself.
For example, let's say you created an alias that pointed to your income tax file.

If you drag the alias, "Income Tax File Alias" that you just created to the trash can, the alias "Income Tax file Alias" would be moved to the trash can, but the file it points to, "Income tax file" would remain where it was. That's because the trash can is part of the operating system and that's how the operating system handles alias files dragged on to the trash can.

However, ShredIt is not part of the operating system - it's an application program. Applications programs don't get the same information from the operating system as the trash can does. When you drag an Alias file on to an application program, the operating system resolves the alias before passing the file name up to the application program. So if you dragged the "Income Tax File Alias" on to ShredIt, the operating system would resolve the alias and pass the name of the file the alias points to, "Income tax file" to ShredIt. ShredIt would then shred the "Income tax file", just like you had just requested it to do.

This is probably not what you wanted ShredIt to do. However, this is not unique to the ShredIt application. All applications on the Macintosh handle aliases this same way, since this is how the operating system works.