MacOS 7.x problem

[Steven Hirsch]

On Wed, 8 Dec 2010, Brent Hilpert wrote:

> On 2010 Dec 8, at 12:49 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:
>> On 2010 Dec 8, at 4:11 AM, Steven Hirsch wrote:
>>> On Mon, 6 Dec 2010, Jason McBrien wrote:
>>>> On Sun, Dec 5, 2010 at 12:32 PM, Steven Hirsch <snhirsch at gmail.com> 
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> The MacUser directory is fine - both data and resource forks are as
>>>>> expected.  However, no matter what I've tried 'Diagnostic1' simply does 
>>>>> not
>>>>> show up in the finder.  I'm sure it's something basic, but I'm not much 
>>>>> of
>>>>> an ancient Mac guru.
>>>> 
>>>> Wild guess, but might be a custom folder icon that's having it's resource
>>>> fork blown away? Did you try rebuilding the desktop on the 68k machine? 
>>>> I'm
>>>> not sure if it's possible, but you might try doing the same on the 
>>>> netatalk
>>>> share.
>>> 
>>> Good thought, but there is no icon information in the netatalk metadata 
>>> (it has a dedicated file for desktop info).  I believe this is something 
>>> much more basic.
>> 
>> If I'm following this correctly, a file - which you know exists - is not 
>> showing up in the finder windows or desktop?
>> 
>> IIRC, there is a HIDDEN attribute for files in the old MacOS, which can be 
>> accessed through something like ResEdit or the Norton Utilities.
>> 
>> I'd have to fire up an MacOS 9 machine to check and I'm not sure the 
>> machine I could easily fire up has the utility to double-check the matter 
>> installed.
>
> I fired up an old Mac Performa 5300CD / MacOS 8.5 and installed Norton 
> Utilities from floppies (that was a nostalgic novelty: flipping floppy disks 
> from install prompts).
>
> There is an "Is Invisible" flag for each file (bit 14 of the Finder Flags), 
> which does exactly what it suggests, and which can be toggled with Norton 
> Disk Editor. I don't know what other means there might be to toggle the flag. 
> I'm not sure this is the nature of the issue you have, so just FWIW ...

I don't have Norton Utilities, but was able to lay my hands on a shareware 
version of "Snitch" that supports a similar function.  After a bit of 
fumbling around (the author spent about 10x the effort on annoying pop-ups 
requesting payment than he did on actually documenting how to use the 
)(*^()*&^% thing) I was able to find and flip off the invisible bit.

I found the tool so annoying that I think I'll go after a copy of Norton 
before considering a shareware payment.

Life is good now, at any rate.

Steve




--