[MOTHERWELL]

"Adobe Help Center" is the name of the folder.

It's owner is 'system', which has read and write. My access is read only, so I cannot delete it.

Can any unix people tell me what command I need to do (bad ex: chown 911 Adobe*)

I always thought the chown command was a little confusing......is there an app with a UI that can accomplish this?

Is it even easier to just do rm as root?

Thanks

[reader50]

To delete from within the Finder:
Get Info on the folder in question. Toggle the "Ownership & Permissions" triangle to show all the parameters. Click the lock icon, authenticate as an admin. Popup the Owner menu and select yourself. Set other permissions as you desire. Click the button to "Apply to enclosed items". Click through the warning dialog. Now you can do what you want to that folder with the Finder.

To delete from within Terminal:
Note, this assumes you have enabled the root user. Otherwise this won't work. Type:
cd
Note that there is a trailing space. Now in the Finder, drag the folder you want into the Terminal window. It's path will be entered for you.
cd ..
This pops you up one folder level.
sudo rm -r "Adobe Help Center"
It will ask for the root password. If it still wants to give you guff, like an endless "Do you really want to delete this subfile (Y/N)", then Control-C out of the command, and try this one instead:
sudo rm -rf "Adobe Help Center"
The sudo part is "superuser do", it causes any commands following it to be executed by root. The -r flag makes the rm command recursive, gets items inside the directory. You need this flag to delete a directory unless it's totally empty. The -f flag forces it to delete and skip objections.
End result: the directory (and it's contents) will be gone.

Further note: The Terminal route is the more dangerous one. Be very careful with that rm command, especially the 2nd version. Using it at the wrong directory level, and using wildcards, can result in huge portions of the drive being erased.

[MOTHERWELL]

Ah...

The lock appeared to be gray like the rest of the pop up menus. Thanks for the response though.

[Max_Doubt_M'Wham]

Are you saying you have fixed the problem MOTHERWELL, or is the lock greyed out? You need to have full Admin Privileges to continue ...

[reader50]

Max_Doubt_M'Wham is correct, you need to be an Admin or root to use the Finder method. The folder in question is owned by root - "system" is one of several aliases that OSX uses to mean root.

[MOTHERWELL]

No the lock was not grey, but it appeared grey to me. I just wasn't looking at it close enough.

Ok here's my problem:

I thought I changed the enclosed items to the same permissions... Here is what I have:

Adobe Help Center/Legal/Tiếng Việt.html

The problem is the Tiếng Việt.html file. I cannot change the permissions on this. When I try I get "An Unexpected Error Occurred (Error 213)"

If I try to remove this file as root in terminal I get this error:
rm: Tiếng Việt.html: No such file or directory


The computer thinks the file doesn't exist. If I open the html file in a browser I get the Page Cannot be Found.

I am pretty sure the file is something from Adobe CS2, which I recently upgraded to CS3

[reader50]

Boot from another disk/partition, and run DiskWarrior or Disk Utility. If the disk gets a clean bill of health, log in as Root and move to the trash. Then force-empty trash - hold down option key while selecting the Empty Trash command.

It could be directory damage, or that the filename seems to have unicode in it. Which may confuse simpler utilities.

[Art Vandelay]

Adobe screwed up that file when it was installed with CS2. It's a known issue. The only way to get rid of it is to repair your disk with Disk Utility or Diskwarrior first. Then you will be able to dispose of it.

You will see an "Illegal Name" error when checking your drive. That is this file. Until you get it fixed, nothing will be able to get rid of it, including Terminal commands.

[MOTHERWELL]

Ok I have DiskWarrior - I want to select 'Rebuild' when I boot from the CD?


Ehh, Ill just boot from the Mac OS X CD and use Disk Utility


Edit: I am getting a kernel panic when I boot from the Mac OS X CD. ??? this is new.

[Art Vandelay]

Sure you're using the right one? Make sure you're using the disc that came with your Mac. If you're using a retail disc, it may be older than your Mac and not contain all the appropriate drivers.

[reader50]

Originally Posted by MOTHERWELL 

Ok I have DiskWarrior - I want to select 'Rebuild' when I boot from the CD?
...

Yes, rebuild.

DiskWarrior is far more capable than Disk Utility, let it handle the repairs if you own it. I tend to use Disk Utility to do quick scans - it's the fastest way to find out if something is wrong. Then I let DiskWarrior do the actual repairs.