Can I delete extra 'Resource' files?

frank777frank777
Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014
Ok, I messed up a couple weeks ago and one of my hard drives died without me having a backup.



I had some project files on the drive I absolutely had to recover.

So one week and $1000. later, I'm back up and running. (Data Recovery seems to be a thriving business!)



The recovery work was done on a PC using software to recover data on a Mac drive.



Most of the files are usable, but inside a lot of the folders there's an extra 'Resource' file that I'm guessing is usually hidden but now exposed because of the recovery.



For example, my file called 'BusinessLetter' now has a counterpart called BusinessLetter.$data.AFP_Resource sitting in its folder as well.



Get Info idenitifies them as Unix Executable Files. I've tried deleting them with a few non-essential files and everything seems to work fine.



However, I'm worried that complex programs like InDesign or similar may need them.



Can I safely delete these Resource files?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,322moderator
    If it's document files then it should be ok. I'd imagine they are the HFS resource forks. Some image documents store thumbnails in them but they're ok to delete. Some application .apps won't work without them but resource forks are generally not important in OS X at all. They came from OS 9 and have just kinda hung around in some apps. They are not maintained on all filesystems e.g an MS-DOS filesystem will strip off the resource forks from a Mac file, which could be why the recovery program dumped it into a separate file.
  • Reply 2 of 4
    frank777frank777 Posts: 5,839member
    Thanks.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    sherman homansherman homan Posts: 167member
    I have dealt with PeeCee data recovery programs turning Mac fonts into Unix executables. So be careful when you throw them out, they may be fonts that the PeeCee doesn't understand. Marvin is right, most of them will be Mac database files that you don't need. And there is always the very real possibility that after a major drive crash/recovery you will have to reinstall programs like Dreamweaver anyway.
  • Reply 4 of 4
    frank777frank777 Posts: 5,839member
    My drive with the OS and Applications is fine. This was another drive that only contained documents - no apps.
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