Strange "Desktop" folder cannot be deleted

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devil horsedevil horse
Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
A folder named "Desktop" on my drive cannot be deleted and moved to trash. It was not created by me and don't know how it generated. I'm wondering if it should be an invisible folder. Does any one know how to get rip of it? Thanks.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 8
    acollinsacollins Posts: 60member
    Where exactly is it on your hard drive? If it's the Desktop folder in your Users folder, it is part of how the system puts things on your desktop. It shouldn't be invisible, but I don't know if it can be deleted.



    I'm pretty sure that, even if you could, you really wouldn't want to, because then I don't know if/how things would appear on your desktop.
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  • Reply 2 of 8
    dviantdviant Posts: 483member
    I have a "desktop" folder at the root of my hard drive (not the one in /users) that refuses to delete as well. Contains nothing.



    What the heck is that?
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  • Reply 3 of 8
    willoughbywilloughby Posts: 1,457member
    sudo rmdir directoryname



    it'll ask you for the admin password and then it will delete it. I'm not sure if its a good idea though, but that will work. If the folder isn't empty, try sudo rm -R directoryName instead.
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  • Reply 4 of 8
    logan calelogan cale Posts: 1,281member
    The desktop folder in the root directory is your Mac OS 9 desktop.
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  • Reply 5 of 8
    spartspart Posts: 2,060member
    If you do not use Mac OS 9 yet still have a "Desktop (Mac OS 9)" directory in the root level of your hard drive, you must also delete the directory "Desktop Folder" using the Terminal. Otherwise, the fscking alias keeps on popping up.
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  • Reply 6 of 8
    defiantdefiant Posts: 4,876member
    I also had this happen to me once. It's actually called "Desktop" and isn't associated with OS 9 at all.
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  • Reply 7 of 8
    kalikali Posts: 634member
    I, too, have this folder appearing from time to time on all my partitions. I can delete them all, but they keep reappearing all the time. I'm tired of them.



    I want to get rid of all those pesky "Desktop" folders forever. I also have a "recent items" folder appearing the same way, on many of my partitions. I can delete it, but it's always poping up from nowhere. What gives ?
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  • Reply 8 of 8
    devil horsedevil horse Posts: 5member
    It is sitting at the root of the hard drive, actually named "Desktop", not that "Desktop Folder" at the other drives or partition. I guess that is something invisible inside it......
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