Invisible items. Cannot delete. Help!
Hey guys. I need some help. I have been cleaning out my computer and deleting things I don't need or use. Well when I was deleting things from my downloads folder, I had some items pop up that didn't have an icon, just a name. Well when you click on it, it simply disappears! Pretty frustrated. Well I dumped the whole folder in the trash and tried to delete and got that "cannot delete file currently in use" message. Force empty trash won't work. Tried Disk Utility and the disk has an error. Tried to repair with boot disk and maintenance programs and none would correct the error! Now I have a couple invisible icons in my trash, one of them that is pretty much stuck to where I cannot rename it or move it because it does the disappearing act thing or is a folder with nothing in it. So frustrated! If anyone can shed some light on this subject and how to remedy the problem would be GREATLY appreciated!!! BTW, my computer is a Macbook Pro 2.16GHz Intel Core Duo
Cody
Cody
Comments
On windows files like this are usually viruses or adware stuff, but OSX doesn't have viruses and stuff like this.
They could be some system files. Usually on OSX the most common hidden files are the system ones.
Hey guys. I need some help. I have been cleaning out my computer and deleting things I don't need or use. Well when I was deleting things from my downloads folder, I had some items pop up that didn't have an icon, just a name. Well when you click on it, it simply disappears! Pretty frustrated. Well I dumped the whole folder in the trash and tried to delete and got that "cannot delete file currently in use" message. Force empty trash won't work. Tried Disk Utility and the disk has an error. Tried to repair with boot disk and maintenance programs and none would correct the error! Now I have a couple invisible icons in my trash, one of them that is pretty much stuck to where I cannot rename it or move it because it does the disappearing act thing or is a folder with nothing in it. So frustrated! If anyone can shed some light on this subject and how to remedy the problem would be GREATLY appreciated!!! BTW, my computer is a Macbook Pro 2.16GHz Intel Core Duo
Cody
You can try two things. First, logout and then login again. This will kill any process that could use the files and you can then try to empty the trash. If it does not work, you can still launch the Terminal.app and navigate to the directory where the files are. You can erase them with the rm command (rm filename). Only pay attention to the file names inserted, so that you don't accidentally delete anything useful for you with the rm command.
This sounds very weird. Before you moved them to trash, what was the location of those files?
On windows files like this are usually viruses or adware stuff, but OSX doesn't have viruses and stuff like this.
They could be some system files. Usually on OSX the most common hidden files are the system ones.
The fact that the files were in the downloads folder means that these are not system files (unless (s)he moved something manually therein) and/or some site (s)he visited probably tried to "infect" the machine. If so, in 99.99% of the cases the attempt would be with some windows crap.
PB, yeah I logged out and started from scratch like you said, and that usually works with a lot of files that don't go away, but I still get the same problem. I'd like to do the Terminal thing, but I am really pretty amateur when it comes to using Terminal.
I used to be a windows guy but I switched to Mac cuz I got tired of the Windows crap and I LOVE my Mac! This is the first time I've had any problem with it. Even with this one problem, I'm still 150,000 times happier with this than PC's. Here are some screenshots of the problem so you guys (and maybe gals too) know what I'm seeing....
http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/...05956322136985
They are in order of the process I go to delete them directly after I restart and log in. The first pics apply to empty trash as well as secure empty trash. The crazy thing is that it wont let me rename the folder, which it shows in the last pic, but when I restart and do the process over again, it takes the name that I TRIED to name it before.
And you're right, to me it seems like a Windows adware or virus that got on my machine and isn't able to carry out it's intentions to the fullest due to it being a Mac, but it won't go away either.
http://aycu16.webshots.com/image/581...6731840_rs.jpg
It won't help you in this situation though. You've already found the problem: your HDD formatting is screwed. Error -36 means that the file can't be found. You have to rectify the problem ASAP. I know it's a pain, but here's what you have to do:
1.) Backup!
2.) Everything!
3.) Backup
4.) Boot from the install discs that came with your Mac
5.) Don't run the installer, invoke Disk Utility from the menu.
6.) Try to repair the disk.
7.) If the disk isn't repairable, you'll have to re-format it. I'd suggest running a "zero-all-data" format (press the "security options?" button in the "erase" tab) to ensure any bad block on the HDD are avoided. This takes a while, since as the name suggests, zeros are written across the whole disk.
8.) Once re-formatted, install OS X and restore everything from backup.