Hi,
Im fairly new to OS X and i was using Stuffit Expander for some pretty big RAR files. The file was corrupt and i tried to extract it a couple of times. When i was looking through my desktop folder through a program i have, it showed all these files that i cant see on the desktop: like .$$ Stuff.....
I have read that these are hidden files, but i have no idea how to delete them, they are taking up about 2 Gigs of my HD and are completely useless. Can anyone please tell me how to delete them? TIA.
Such files can be seen in the terminal using the ls (list with just the l and s) command Make sure you know the file path, and you don't need to change the directory to see the list
Mac Specs: Mac Pro Quad Xeon 2.66GHz 3GB RAM, G4 Quicksilver w/Sonnet 1GHz Encore ST, 1ghz G4 Powerbook
If you find them using the desktop "Find" function by setting the visibility to invisible, you should be able to drag them from the results window to the trash.
DESCRIPTION
The rm utility attempts to remove the non-directory type files specified
on the command line. If the permissions of the file do not permit writ-
ing, and the standard input device is a terminal, the user is prompted
(on the standard error output) for confirmation.
The options are as follows:
-d Attempt to remove directories as well as other types of
files.
-f Attempt to remove the files without prompting for confirma-
tion, regardless of the file's permissions. If the file does
not exist, do not display a diagnostic message or modify the
:
rm, unlink - remove directory entries
SYNOPSIS
rm [-dfiPRrvW] file ...
unlink file
DESCRIPTION
The rm utility attempts to remove the non-directory type files specified
on the command line. If the permissions of the file do not permit writ-
ing, and the standard input device is a terminal, the user is prompted
(on the standard error output) for confirmation.
The options are as follows:
-d Attempt to remove directories as well as other types of
files.
-f Attempt to remove the files without prompting for confirma-
tion, regardless of the file's permissions. If the file does
not exist, do not display a diagnostic message or modify the
:
exit status to reflect an error. The -f option overrides any
previous -i options.
-i Request confirmation before attempting to remove each file,
regardless of the file's permissions, or whether or not the
standard input device is a terminal. The -i option overrides
any previous -f options.
-P Overwrite regular files before deleting them. Files are
overwritten three times, first with the byte pattern 0xff,
then 0x00, and then 0xff again, before they are deleted.
-R Attempt to remove the file hierarchy rooted in each file
argument. The -R option implies the -d option. If the -i
option is specified, the user is prompted for confirmation
before each directory's contents are processed (as well as
:
before each directory's contents are processed (as well as
before the attempt is made to remove the directory). If the
user does not respond affirmatively, the file hierarchy
rooted in that directory is skipped.
-r Equivalent to -R.
-v Be verbose when deleting files, showing them as they are
removed.
-W Attempt to undelete the named files. Currently, this option
can only be used to recover files covered by whiteouts.
The rm utility removes symbolic links, not the files referenced by the
links.
It is an error to attempt to remove the files ``.'' or ``..''.
When the utility is called as unlink, only one argument, which must not
be a directory, may be supplied. No options may be supplied in this sim-
ple mode of operation, which performs an unlink(2) operation on the
passed argument.
:
The rm utility exits 0 if all of the named files or file hierarchies were
removed, or if the -f option was specified and all of the existing files
or file hierarchies were removed. If an error occurs, rm exits with a
value >0.
NOTE
The rm command uses getopt(3) to parse its arguments, which allows it to
accept the `--' option which will cause it to stop processing flag
options at that point. This will allow the removal of file names that
begin with a dash (`-'). For example:
rm -- -filename
The same behavior can be obtained by using an absolute or relative path
reference. For example:
rm /home/user/-filename
rm ./-filename
SEE ALSO
rmdir(1), undelete(2), unlink(2), fts(3), getopt(3), symlink(7)
BUGS
The -P option assumes that the underlying file system is a fixed-block
file system. In addition, only regular files are overwritten, other types of files are not.
I have the same problem. About 8 folders of StuffIt that didn't unarchive correctly are still on my desktop. I can see them using Azereus and opening a torrent and tehy are listed. I can't drag them into the trash or delete them.
I have deleted these before easily but I forgot how its been a while.
I tried using the 'find' and it never found them.
I tried using Terminal and it said no directory existed.
Is there anyway just to allow to see invisible files and then just to drag them into the trash? Thanks.
