OS X :: 4 GB Space Disappeared In Private Folder
Jun 21, 2007
So my computer has about 4gb of free space on the hd. I leave for a few minutes, come back and see in the finder that there is 0KB! It also won't let me do anything, not even quit itunes because it says it can't save the library file. It's weird because the computer was idle, I'm pretty sure the only open app was iTunes.
So I restart the computer but nothing has changed. So I transfer a bunch of files to an external HD then delete them. So I now have free space. I want to know where the space went though? I opened OmniDiskSweeper to see what's taking up space and I see this folder called "private" that I've never seen before. Where is this located and could this be the space that disappeared? I included a screenshot so you can see where the folder is.
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Feb 22, 2009
I know this has been asked before and I asked it once too, but I don't understand all these technical terms and nothing I did worked. I've now got over 20GB in this "private" folder as I saw in Disc Inventory X. I cannot find this folder anywhere when I search and I cannot delete it.
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Feb 20, 2010
I realised a big chunk of my hard drive space missing and couldn't find where it had gone. I downloaded Disk Inventory and ran the program. It shows that i have a folder called 'Private' within this are three sub folders:
Var
Log
Asl
I have searched for all of these and can't find them on my hard drive anywhere. Can anyone tell me what these are, if I can delete them and if so how do I find them.
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Nov 17, 2008
I was wondering how to get into my private folder? where is that located, what is the path?
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Apr 28, 2009
I have accidentally deleted the Private folder in the root of the HD. Now OSX will not boot. The folder is still sitting in my Trash folder and I would like from the Boot CD Terminal to copy back from the trash to the Macintosh HD/ location.
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May 14, 2008
I was wondering if it is possible to make a certain folder password protected? If so, how would I do that? I only want to require password on one specific folder.
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Aug 24, 2008
I deleted my /Private folder. I'm not sure how I was able to but I think I deleted some random little files in my Mac HD before that and I do recall entering my password (the administrative / master password) to authorize the deletion. So that's how I got into this situation. I'd just also like to say that I do not have my information backed up.
What I Have Tried:
- Rebooting in Single-User mode following some code I found off a forum for someone who had only deleted their /var folder- Failed!
- Rebooting in SU mode following code off Apple Support website- Failed!
- Called 1-800-MY-APPLE - was told I could only reinstall everything- Failed!
- Went into the Genius Bar to talk to a Genius. He tried to start up remotely with an External HD- Failed!
- Was told by the Genius to take a firewire cable and hook up my computer to another Mac and start in Target Disk mode, move all my data onto there (or an external HD attached to computer 2) and then reinstall - Failed! (Reason: The second computer could not detect my computer? Indexing was taking forever but I couldn't stop Spotlight from indexing because I could not find it... My disk / the icon does not appear on the desktop. BUT, it was detected through Time Machine.)
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Apr 8, 2009
Just did it by mistake. Now the Mac can not show up the log in screen anymore. How can I recover from it.
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Apr 26, 2009
I was searching around on Google trying to find a way of creating a private folder, all I found was articles saying that you had to create a disk image of a folder, the only problem is that the whole password system wouldn't always work. So I thought of a better way, what you do is with the folder you wish to create private open the Get Info panel. Then open the Sharing & Permissions panel, enter your user password if prompted, turn all of them to drop box only, then click the lock, users will now only be able to view this folder if they unlock the panel with your user password and then change the style.
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May 27, 2009
I deleted the "hidden" private folder on my mac, but that still on trash. Now the big problems are:
- when I try to open Terminal to move the folder from the trash to my hard disk, appears a message that says: the administrator doesn't specified your shell with a legal value.
- I can't change the date and time;
- well almost nothing.
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Dec 1, 2009
For some reason unknown to me, my "private" folder is visible. I've done all the "usual" things and even have an Automator action that shows and hides invisible files, but I just can't make it invisible again. Now this isn't really a BAD thing as I know how to poke around in there, but still... it's a mystery to me.
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Jan 23, 2010
Ugh. So I was cleaning out my HD with 'WhatSize' and saw the 'private folder', which was about 4.6 GB. Thinking nothing of it and also suspecting that this might be the folder responsible for the my auto-depleting harddrive I trashed it. Upon stupidly emptying the trash I found that some files were emptied while most of them survived. Noticing that I wasn't able to open iTunes or even reinstall it, I restarted the computer.
Now, I can't get into Snow Leopard and have to use Windows (I have Bootcamp). I tried doing the "ditto /volumes..." command in single-user mode, but it says it couldn't find my username. I tried looking up the username with the 'launch ctl load' command, but it can't find the Directory Services file. Is there any way I can get Snow Lepoard back without losing any space? I have a lot of important media that I would really like to keep (photos, films, music, etc.)
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Feb 7, 2010
I moved my Mac HD's private folder to the trash not knowing that it stores thousands of crucial UNIX folders (one of which that stores the admin password). I haven't yet trashed it, but I can't move it back to its original location because when I try to do that Leopard asks for the admin password but the password doesn't exist anymore because it's been moved to the trash. Is there anyway I can remove the private folder from the Trash and put it back? Maybe some kind of Terminal command?
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May 2, 2010
I deleted my private folder. It's still in the trash, and it's also in my applications folder if that makes a difference. I turned off my mac and now I can't boot it back up. I can boot into single user mode and tried entering some codes in there but I keep getting errors. I have a new Macbook Pro with Snow Leopard, and I have the install disk but I can't get the computer to start up with it.
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Mar 7, 2010
I accidentally trashed my private folder and then emptied my trash. I have looked into it and everyone has answers on how to reinstall it if I didn't empty the trash but the issue is I did empty the trash. My computer won't start up all the way as you would imagine. I have my disk and everything but I do not have all of my things backed up or archived.
My issue is I can easily reinstall Mac OS X 10.4 but I have some vital videos and footage for a video we are working on that I cannot deleted or take the chance of losing. Does anyone know a way I can back up the movie files or any way of doing anything of that sort? This is very important I do not have the tapes anymore with the raw footage on it so if I lose this footage pretty much our last year of work and filming is ruined and so is our release date in two weeks.
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Feb 8, 2009
For some reason this is now visible in my hard drive's root. How do I hide it again? I don't wanna go near that thing!
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Feb 10, 2009
I have some files on my desktop right now that I would like to secure from wondering eyes. Other people use my Macbook Pro from time to time and I don't want anyone to read these documents. Is there a way to create a folder/file that requires a password to gain entry to view the contents of this folder/file?
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Jan 30, 2010
I have a strange "/private" folder in my root directory (Macintosh HD) after a Time Capsule restore today. The folder is ~5GB in size, and appears to have been created during the restore process. The files in the folder have strange-appearing "system" file type names. Can I safely delete this folder? Not sure why its there, but given its size, I'd prefer to delete it.
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Apr 17, 2012
They are taking up 200 GB of my hard drive. how I could stop this or if it is even safe to delete them?
Info:mini 1.1, Mac OS X (10.6.5)
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Dec 19, 2008
When I pressed F8, four virtual desktops appeared on the screen. However, the icons and dock disappeared. Anybody knows how to fix this?
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Aug 25, 2008
Been using my MBA for 3 months now and noticed that I have lost a large amount of hard drive space, I currently have 40GB free when I have hardly anything on the computer, I have a few freeware apps and about 8GB of Music, thats it, I have looked at where the space has gone but can't figure it out. Is there any such tools for removing stuff that is not used and to do a "Spring Clean" to get rid of anything I don't need?
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Mar 26, 2010
After deleting windows 7, I went back into boot camp to merge partitions and after that operation completed, the 32gb of space that was used for the partition was gone. I tried using the disk utility to find second partition but can't, it only recognizes the partition that mac osx is on and says it is 120gb capacity when hard drive is 150 gb. I would like to format the entire hard drive and have it as one partition again
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May 15, 2012
I deleted some files in a folder named "private" on my drive and now my imac will not boot up.
Info:
iMac (24-inch Early 2008), Mac OS X (10.7.3)
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Aug 20, 2009
Suddenly, all my applications in the applications folder have disappeared! I was suspicious when, trying to open up various apps on my dock, they wouldn't open and I got a question mark over the icons. It is showing '0' applications. I tried copying my applications from my external hard drive. It looks like it is copying over and when the copying is finished, poof, it disappears and applications folder shows '0'. I am on Mac OS 10.3.9, iMac (lamp-shade style), processor is 800 MHz G4, and memory is 768 MB. This is pretty critical, I can't do anything with no applications! (Would this be some strange virus?)
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Sep 25, 2010
I recently upgraded to 10.6.4 but stupidly did not create a back up immediately afterwards. Now, a couple of weeks on, after some music software crashed I appear to have lost all my system utilities files in the Utilities folder inside the Applications folder. This includes my disk Ulity File. I cannot locate them via finder and although I have certainly not deleted them, they have gone. I can't repair my permissions etc. I tried restoring the Utility folder contents from the previous OX version via Time Machine, however ( as expected) I got a message declaring the Utilities file was not the correct version.
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Nov 5, 2010
I'm not tech savy at all, so I need any advice people might have about this. A couple of hours ago all the files in my Documents folder disappeared. The folder is there, but only two documents are in it (the two I was working on today).
I can't find any of my files by searching in the finder window. I have no idea where to start on this. I haven't backed up any of my files because clearly I was operating under the misconception that losing all of my documents all at once could never happen to me.
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Jan 1, 2008
My stacks folder dissapeared? how do i get it back?
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Dec 10, 2001
My documents folder has disappeared, but i know it is still there. I can navigate to it thru the terminal. I can even open it via the terminal, but once i close the window, it is gone again in the finder. If i change it to Column view while i have it open,it shows it as greyed out in my home directory.
I have looked at the permissions, and they are set to give me rwx on the folder and everything in it.
I have run fsck, and found no problems.
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Mar 2, 2012
I was trying to share this folder, which resides in my secondary hdd. Since i find it too **** hard to share some folders with a windows pc, i guess i messed up some stuff somehow. I tried creating user names, changing share settings but NOTHING worked! The share window is just ridiculous! But anyway That's not my main problem now.Every single file that in that folder i tried to share is gone now. The subfolders are there, but the files are gone. And not deleted; gone. Because i can see and open them with the Pathfinder application. Also can see them under bootcamped Windows. And yes, hidden files are shown at the moment.
Info:
Mac OS X (10.7.2)
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Mar 2, 2012
My Application folder has disappeared from the Dock. How do I replace it?
Info:
iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)
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