[Tiresias]

Here's the situation:

I used my 120 GB Porsche LaCie harddisk to transfer a bunch of .avi files from a PC at work to my Mac. They were from a totally legit Korean media website—One that requires you to register and pay money to download music and films. But when I connected my external to my Mac, one of the files is weird as hell: It's invisible except for the file name; it disappears when you click on it, and, therefore, it can't be deleted. When I grab it I can drag it to the trash, but I can't delete it from the external (Nor can it be dropped on to desktop or otherwise moved off the external).

Another weird thing about it is that it disappears, as I said, but when you close the folder and open it again—there the bloody thing is again: A decapitated file name without an icon.

Still another weird thing is it sits wherever it wants to sit—I have my finder set to "Snap to grid" but this file doesn't obey. It sometimes sits out of place (although, it behaved while I took it's photo below).

I smell file corruption.

I've tried de- and reconnecting the harddisk. I've shutdown and logged out. I tried everything.

Can some one please tell me how to delete this annoying file?! Or—failing that—how to reset my LaCie external harddisk.

It has no information other than the creation date. No size, no "kind", nothing.

Here's a screenshot of the file—both as a list and icon:

[utw-Mephisto]

You could re-format the disk using the disk manager ... other then that .. nooooo idea .. thats a weird one ....

[TETENAL]

a) Try to delete the file in the Terminal using the rm command
b) Attach the drive to an OS 9 machine or PC and delete it there.

[P]

First try Disk Utility and see if it finds any errors on the drive.

[Thorzdad]

You say you got these files from a PAY site. Could it be this particular file is some sort of security file? Something that hangs around to ensure you can play the files? This is just wild speculation, of course.
Have you searched the PC you transferred the .avi files from to see if this same file is there, too?

[Ganesha]

Have you tried deleting it from a Windows PC? I smell incompatible FAT32 file name.

[CheesePuff]

I'd first try deleting it using 'rm' in Terminal.

[Warhaven]

I'm willing to be it has an invalid character as part of the file name. I don't believe RM will work, as the file isn't linked correctly because of the bad file name. I had that issue before with a badly named MP3 from a Windows buddy of mine.

I believe the way I fixed it was moving/renaming it first using the mv command, and then deleting it. So, if the initial suggestion of using RM doesn't work, try this:

1) Open your terminal
2) Type "mv " (without quotes, and with a space on the end)
3) Drag the file to your terminal
4) Type: " ~/Desktop/foo.bar" (without quotes, and with the leading space if it didn't auto-insert one for you)
5) Drag foo.bar to your trash and empty it.

[Cadaver]

I had the same kind of magic file on a USB thumbdrive once. It was an icon-less file and would disappear when I tried to click on it.
Had to reformat the device to make it go away.

[Eriamjh]

Originally Posted by CheesePuff 

I'd first try deleting it using 'rm' in Terminal.

Exactly how does one do that if the filename is those odd characters, copy and paste?

[Catfish_Man]

Drag and drop the file onto Terminal, as Warhaven said.

[Hal Itosis]

Originally Posted by Catfish_Man 

Drag and drop the file onto Terminal, as Warhaven said.

Copy and paste also works as well.

[voodoo]

Mac OS 9 can delete this. I have seen this before. Ah the immense power of OS 9

V

[Hi I'm Ben]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh 

Exactly how does one do that if the filename is those odd characters, copy and paste?

Those aren't really "odd characters" it's Korean. To get it they can type it if they know korean. Copy and paste works too.


I think people should also be more mindful of the solutions they're giving others. Having a hard time deleting a file should not be grounds for formatting a drive. If you're unsure if a good solution to the problem do not contribute a bad one.


I would try to use Omnidisksweeper or something of that nature to delete the file. Omnidisksweeper isn't free I believe but I know there are free alternatives.

[badidea]

Originally Posted by Hi I'm Ben 

Copy and paste works too.

Since it disappears when you click it I don't think that copy and paste would work!
Dragging it to the terminal might do the trick but if it doesn't, someone really should learn some Korean or he won't get around a reformat!

(or one of the many file helpers might do the trick - "file buddy"?)

[Hal Itosis]

Originally Posted by badidea 

Since it disappears when you click it I don't think that copy and paste would work!
Dragging it to the terminal might do the trick

Oh yeah... as if that makes any sense at all.

a) if it "disappears when you click it", then how can it POSSIBLY be dragged?
b) copy/paste does not require "clicking" (arrow keys could suffice to select).

Another workaround is using tab-completion in Terminal.
Just type rm -vfr <tab><tab> (keep tabbing till the name auto fills)

In case that doesn't work, add

bind '"\t": menu-complete'

to the ~/.bashrc (or ~/.bash_profile or ~/.profile or ~/.bash_login as the case may be)

Anyway... if this user hasn't run fsck yet (or Disk Utility from another boot volume),
then all this Terminal talk (and File Buddy and OS9 and whatever) could be for naught.

[badidea]

Originally Posted by Hal Itosis 

Oh yeah... as if that makes any sense at all.

Oh yeah!?

Originally Posted by Tiresias 

it disappears when you click on it

Originally Posted by Tiresias

When I grab it I can drag it to the trash

Seems I am the only one who can read!?

[PER3]

It doesn't seem to have an icon.

How about pasting an icon there in "Get Info", changing the name to something Latin, and playing with "Ownership and Permissions"?

And then trying to delete...

[CheesePuff]

Originally Posted by PER3 

It doesn't seem to have an icon.

How about pasting an icon there in "Get Info", changing the name to something Latin, and playing with "Ownership and Permissions"?

And then trying to delete...

It goes away when he clicks it apparently.

[voodoo]

Look, to all of you wearing the smartypants today:

Mac OS X is *INCAPABLE* of doing ANYTHING with that file. No app, certainly not the Terminal and no disk utility or permission changing can touch that file.

This is an OS X bug.

Mac OS 9 can remove this file. Possibly windows, I don't know since I don't use crap.

So, let's just end the stupid bickering, NOTHING CAN BE DONE ABOUT THIS FILE IN OR THROUGH MAC OS X.

Sheesh.

V

[PER3]

Originally Posted by CheesePuff 

It goes away when he clicks it apparently.

I understand.

What would happen if Tiresias scrolled to the file in the finder ("list" or "column" view), and then did an Apple-I or selected the Info icon (if he had it in his menu bar)?

Would that be the same as a click?

[TETENAL]

Tiresias hasn't posted in this thread since more than a week. The file is probably deleted already since a long time. There is no point in continuing this discussion.

[steve626]

Originally Posted by Tiresias 

They were from a totally legit Korean media website—One that requires you to register and pay money to download music and films ...

Here a lesson learned -- don't download from so-called "legit" Korean (!) websites. I'll bet the price was too good to be true for all that music and films. But given what they've done to your drive (you will need to reformat), I'd check your credit card statements fairly carefully from hereon going forward ...

[walkerjs]

Being confronted with this I would probably go into terminal, use cd to position myself in the directory (folder) and use bash shell tab file completion to try see what the file name actually is. Or use ls to see what it might be.

Then rm it.

[Catfish_Man]

Originally Posted by walkerjs 

Being confronted with this I would probably go into terminal, use cd to position myself in the directory (folder) and use bash shell tab file completion to try see what the file name actually is. Or use ls to see what it might be.

Then rm it.

There are some cases (I can't find the link for one, but it involved constructing an extremely deep directory tree) where the path-based *nix and cocoa tools can't handle a file, but the old file id based APIs can. That's possibly why voodoo was saying OS9 can handle it.

[walkerjs]

Well, in that case I would probably create a new applications folder elsewhere, drag the good folders over to that folder, then trash/recreate the entire folder complete with malformed named file.

But then this is the Applications folder. That might be tricky. Would perhaps the use of a wildcard work? I'd at least pipe the results of ls into od and try to get exactly what the first couple of characters were and try a wildcard rm.

It's probably moot at this point. In the days of old one would use icheck to get the inode of the file in question and try to handle it from there. Of course if that were the case, a Mac user would be using System 7 to try to handle the malformed file.

[jsawers]

I'm trying to delete a file that was installed as part of Photoshop CS2. The filename is "Tang Viet.html" but is uses foreign characters for accents. It has resisted all attempts. I cannot rename it in the finder or terminal, I cannot "rm" it or "mv" it. When I drag the file into the terminal it's name comes out as unicode escaped characters "\u3540 \u3133 \u5799" etc. But it still complains that that file cannot be found.

It looks like the shell/finder isn't translating the character set/encoding properly, so it's can't actually find the file by name.

I don't have any OS9 machines around to try that solution on (can I even boot my AlBook G4 into 9?). Is there some way I can do this from Classic ? I know it doesn't give me a finder view, but maybe there is an old OS9 app that will give me filesystem access. Though I'm not sure if that will work, since the filesystem commands probably get translated via OSX.

At least it's a small file, so I could live with it, but I'd rather not. Any thoughts ?

[Sub]

Never mind.

[TETENAL]

Try FileBuddy or the old FileBuddy 7 in Classic.

[Hal Itosis]

Originally Posted by jsawers 

I'm trying to delete a file that was installed as part of Photoshop CS2. The filename is "Tang Viet.html" but is uses foreign characters for accents. It has resisted all attempts. I cannot rename it in the finder or terminal, I cannot "rm" it or "mv" it. When I drag the file into the terminal it's name comes out as unicode escaped characters "\u3540 \u3133 \u5799" etc. But it still complains that that file cannot be found.

It looks like the shell/finder isn't translating the character set/encoding properly, so it's can't actually find the file by name.

At least it's a small file, so I could live with it, but I'd rather not. Any thoughts ?

If you had put it in the trash and emptied, then it's possible the file has been unlinked
(and therefore cannot be "accessed"), but -- due to the funky chars -- the OS is having
trouble removing its **name** from the directory file. You should boot from the system
DVD, and run Disk Utility from there to repair the disk (not 'permissions'), or run fsck -fy
from SingleUser mode.

[Ratspittle]

Originally Posted by jsawers 

I'm trying to delete a file that was installed as part of Photoshop CS2. The filename is "Tang Viet.html" but is uses foreign characters for accents. It has resisted all attempts. I cannot rename it in the finder or terminal, I cannot "rm" it or "mv" it. When I drag the file into the terminal it's name comes out as unicode escaped characters "\u3540 \u3133 \u5799" etc. But it still complains that that file cannot be found.

It looks like the shell/finder isn't translating the character set/encoding properly, so it's can't actually find the file by name.

I don't have any OS9 machines around to try that solution on (can I even boot my AlBook G4 into 9?). Is there some way I can do this from Classic ? I know it doesn't give me a finder view, but maybe there is an old OS9 app that will give me filesystem access. Though I'm not sure if that will work, since the filesystem commands probably get translated via OSX.

At least it's a small file, so I could live with it, but I'd rather not. Any thoughts ?

That is the very same file I got with CS2. I tried EVERYTHING the above posters suggested. The ONLY thing that fixed it was disk warrior. I can't remember now what the details are, but disk warrior will fix it. Somewhere on these forums is an old thread about it. Sometime last year...It drove me nuts too, I sympathize

[-Q-]

So I got the CS3 upgrade and installed it this weekend. In trying to remove CS2 from my machine, I was hit by the same 'trash won't empty' issue because of the Tang Viet.html file. Fortunately, I found a solution! I don't know if this will work if you have a file you cannot delete, but its worth a try:

Boot/reboot your mac into Safe Boot Mode (hold down the Shift key when booting/rebooting your mac). This can take some time so as soon as you notice your machine taking longer to boot that normal, you can remove your finger from the shift key.
Log in as administrator.
Empty the trash.

Yep, that simple.

I haven't dug into the 'how's' or 'why's' of this method, but it did work in getting rid of that stupid file so I thought I'd share.

[Aron Peterson]

Disk Warrior or Drive Genius will fix these errors. It's the best way to do it because usually it's a file system problem that will remain even if you manage to trash the file in safe mode.