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.
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.
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.
View 7 Replies View RelatedI was wondering how to get into my private folder? where is that located, what is the path?
View 2 Replies View RelatedI 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.
View 13 Replies View RelatedI 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.
View 24 Replies View RelatedI 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.)
Just did it by mistake. Now the Mac can not show up the log in screen anymore. How can I recover from it.
View 2 Replies View RelatedI 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.
View 20 Replies View RelatedI 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.
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.
View 3 Replies View RelatedUgh. 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.)
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?
View 3 Replies View RelatedI 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.
View 1 Replies View RelatedI 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.
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!
View 7 Replies View RelatedI 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?
View 17 Replies View RelatedI 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.
View 5 Replies View RelatedThey 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)
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)
I had a program in Windows that graphically showed different slices of files on my computer and let me drill down on folders that were using the most data. It was very helpful in trying to clean up junk. Is there an equivalent program that does the same in OS X? Freeware if possible.
View 3 Replies View RelatedI'm running OS X 10.6.2 Snow Leopard (I also BootCamp to Windows XP on occasion if it matters) on a 20" Intel-based iMac (the first aluminum series when there was still an aluminum border around the screen). I have had it since mid-late of last year, and it has been running fine aside from a few common issues. The issue I've run in to now is that the folder icons have vanished from everywhere; the desktop, the dock, the finder, etc. They are replaced by either just a blank space, or the question mark. Upon closer inspection, diving into the system files, I discovered a number of the system applications are also lacking icons. Here is a screenshot to illustrate my point: [URL]
I have done a fair bit of crawling around and discovered a few methods to correct this, but to no avail. I have...
1. Simply tried restarting the computer, multiple times.
2. I have tried Force Quitting the Finder.
3. I have tried going into the Terminal and typing 'killall Finder'.
4. Deleting the various .plist files that have been suggested for similar problems.
5. I tried repairing the permissions through the Disc Utility
6. There was another very long command that was recommended be put into the Terminal as well, but I can't recall the command at the moment.
Another concerning fact about this whole mess is that I jumped into Candybar, more out of curiosity than anything, and the place where the Folder icons should have appeared doesn't even get displayed anymore, as though they don't exist. I'm not using any different programs for Spotlight, or anything of the nature. The most I've done is I have CleanMyMac that I run pretty regularly, and the last thing I installed before the issues began was iStat for the Dashboard. I know that my end all solution would be to just back up the files that I need and reinstall SL, but if there is a way to fix this without it coming to that, I would prefer to go that route. In part because I don't have the restore disc with me, stupid move on my part and I recognize that.
I deleted a folder that nearly summed up to be 50 GB worth of files. I simply dragged the folder over the trash can. Now, the trash can shows empty (I never emptied it and it never even showed full) and the folder isn't where it used to be. I searched for the folder in Spotlight and it apparently doesn't exist. But my hard drive's memory sure thinks so. I didn't get the 50 GB back. What happened?
View 11 Replies View RelatedIMAC 13.3..Can not use mail, because I do not have space on my home folder.
Info:
MacBook Pro
On upgrading to Lion I have lost the info at the bottom of the window to see how much space i have left at teh bottom of the finder window.Can anyone help me in finding the settings to get the info back
Info:
Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.3)
I like to use private browsing. Why is it after I set up my top sites and then use private browsing, if I open another window (command, n), I'll lose my top sites. Before I leave top sites, I make sure that I'm done editing and that the thumb tack is blue and not black which I'm told saves the sites. So what's going on? I'm actually at the Apple Store and the trainer at my personal projects sessions just doesn't know why this doesn't work. Anyone know how I can keep my top sites while I use private browsing?
View 2 Replies View RelatedWhat is a Remote IP, Public IP, and Private IP?
View 1 Replies View RelatedI have a group of docs on my MBP that contain private stuff - bank a/c details etc...
Now I keep those files in an encrypted sparse disk image and I'm reasonably confident that if my MBP is stolen they won't be able to access that disk image.
But this just occurred to me: when I open those files in Pages is there a temp copy of the file save somewhere outside of the sparse disk image that could be found?
I really don't want to use file vault to encrypt the whole disk but I do want to be sure those private files won't get accessed.
I have just recently got my first mac, moving from a windows computer.
On my previous pc on internet explorer there was an option for 'Private Browsing' which didn't leave any files or anything and the sites visited were fully untraceable.
On Safari i have noticed the same option, does this do the same (doesn't leave any cache or history or anything like that?)
I've been a PC user for 20 years, but thinking of switching to an Imac. My main concern before plunging in is with regards to data protection - particularly if I have to send the Imac in for repair. On my PC, I can control what part I want to replace, and I never send a harddrive in for repair. I'm paranoid about data privacy.
But if I buy an Imac, removing the harddrive violates the warranty. And if my Imac refuses to bootup, I can't wipe the drive before sending in for repair. Will the apple repair center be willing to remove the harddrive and return it to me before starting repair?
