Self-cleaning ’tmp’ directory in Windows

I’ve recently migrated from Ubuntu 14 to Windows 10. One feature that I really missed on Windows is the tmp/ directory that automatically cleans itself up upon reboot. On Ubuntu, I used tmp/ instead of my Downloads folder and it worked great. Here’s how I’ve achieved the same behaviour on my Windows system.

The target, the job

First, created my self-cleaning directory. Set it up under C:\Users\Ernest\Temp .

Next, I created a script that would execute the cleaning. Under Ubuntu, the entire command would be rm -Rf <directory> . It turns out that using basic Windows shell for this task is not so great, so I decided to use PowerShell. Here’s the entire script:

# clear_temp_folder.ps1

Remove-Item -Recurse -Path "C:\Users\Ernest\Temp\*"

Not bad!

The execution

I’ve used the Task Scheduler app bundled with Windows to schedule the script. To create the task, fire up the Task Scheduler, then go Action -> Create Basic Task…. I used the following parameters:

Trigger: When I log on

Action: Start a Program

When asked for Program/Script, enter

powershell

Under Add arguments (optional), enter

-ExecutionPolicy ByPass -File "C:\Path\To\clear_temp_folder.ps1"

Finally, change the executing user to SYSTEM . Find your task in the Task Scheduler Library, right-click and select Properties….

Under Security options, click on Change User or Group…. After entering SYSTEM and closing the dialog, your Properties window should look like this:

That should be all. You can test the script right from the Task Scheduler (use the Actions pane on the right). If the script doesn’t seem to run on login (but works when executed manually), you can enable task history to de-bug.