Can't get rid of files with sudo rm: Operation not permitted?!?

I just noticed that I have a few directories in my files that have a username of "unknown" from GetInfo (username of 314112960 from ls -l) and can't be touched by me. I opened Terminal, and tried to "sudo chown" and "sudo chmod" them; both came back with "Operation not permitted". Can someone tell me how it's possible that su is not allowed to touch them, and more importantly, how I go about civilizing them so that I can see what's there and get rid of it? Thanks,
Mike

ls -lod yourfile
If it says schg, then you have to reboot into single
user's mode (hold down command-s while the machine
reboots), then run fsck (the prompts will suggest
what to type, so you don't have to memorize it here),
then mount the file system, run fsck again if there
was a problem reported the first time, and when you
get the all clear, then navigate to where the file
is, issue the command
chflags noschg yourfile
rm -R yourfile
and then run fsck one more time (it helps to be
paranoid) and then reboot.
Thanks for the specific instructions! I did that and here's what happened.
The first fsck said everything was fine. The chflags was ok as well. I tried to chown both directories then, to see what was there, and the first time it failed with a "operation not allowed" error. I then did rm -R on one of the directories, and it disappeared. I then tried the chown again on the other one, and it worked! Weird. Maybe there's some latency here somehow. Anyway, I decided I wanted the whole thing gone and I did an rm -Rf on it, and it deleted almost everything, except for one file, which was a link to a nonexistent file (it had an ls -l of "lrwxrwxrwx" (is that a hard link?). When I try to delete that one, it says "no such file or directory". I thought rm was supposed to delete the link, not the file the link is pointing to! Anyway, I couldn't think of any way to get rid of it - it just won't let me do it. Anyone have any ideas how to get rid of this link? It's sitting at the bottom of a long tree of directories and I'd now like the whole thing gone... Oh and then I fsck'd again, which said no error, and I rebooted. Finder won't let me delete it either (error 43, file cannot be found). What do you think?
Thanks,
Mike

Similar Messages

My lil bro locked my ipod.. he doesnt know the combination he used though.. how can i unlock the ipod if i can't get it to unlock with itunes because its not registered in my cp?

my lil bro locked my ipod.. he doesnt know the combination he used though.. how can i unlock the ipod if i can't get it to unlock with itunes because its not registered in my cp?

Place the iPod in Recovery mode and then connect to your computer and restore via iTunes.

-bash: ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Operation not permitted

Hi all,
i´m preparing a linux 64bits environment to install Oracle 10g R2. I´m following the installation manual and there say that:
Depending on the oracle user's default shell, make the following changes to the default shell startup file:
For the Bourne, Bash, or Korn shell, add the following lines in the /etc/profile file (or the /etc/profile.local file on SUSE systems):
if [ $USER = "oracle" ]; then
if [ $SHELL = "/bin/ksh" ]; then
ulimit -p 16384
ulimit -n 65536
else
ulimit -u 16384 -n 65536
fi
fi
Ok, I did it, so when execute the follow comand I get a error like this.
tetis:/etc # su - oracle
-bash: ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Operation not permitted
oracle@tetis:~>
Can anybody help me ?
Regards,
Wander (Brazil)

The limits for -u and -n are defined in limits.conf, it looks like the -n section is not working (-u is already 16384), just to double check, show us the output for:
$ more /etc/security/limits.conf | grep oracle
oracle              soft    nproc   2047
oracle              hard    nproc   16384
oracle              soft    nofile 1024
oracle              hard    nofile 65536
$ more /etc/pam.d/login | grep pam_limits
session    required     pam_limits.soEnrique

How can I get rid of files that cannot be imported error message

Hello, this is my first post. I am a new mac user. I have imported my jpgs from an external hard drive which was in the most part successful, however, 14 of the files appear to be corrupted and every time I open iphoto9, I get the error message, '14 of your files could not be imported, would you like to import them now?' I have tried choosing both options yes and no and it then writes error message telling me it has created recovered photos folder. When you go to this folder it is empty and every time I restart iphoto, I get the same message. I have tried deleting all the files and re-importing only to find that the number of corrupted files has now doubled. I have also deleted the iphotos library recovered photo folders to no avail. I have tried creating a new library and importing the files to that but the same problem occurred. How can I get rid of this repeated error as I am now up to recovered folder number 47! Help!

P Robbins
Welcome to the Apple user to user assistance forums
quit iPhoto and right click (control click) on the iPhoto library (in the pictures folder by default) and select the show package contents command - find the import (or importing) folder and drag it to the desktop and launch iPhoto - you should be fine now - open the import(ing) folder on your desktop and if there are any photos you want import them then trash the folder
LN

How can I get rid of a stuck update which will not install or cancel?

I asked for updates to add-ons. One update turned out to be for McAfee Site Advisor. I restarted the computer but after restarting the update shows as "This update will be installed when Firefox is restarted" even though it had just been restarted. I tried restarting again, twice, but there is no change. I tried to cancel the install but clicking on Cancel does nothing. So I cannot install the update and I can't get rid of it. What now? The other updates were OK.
Firefox 3.6.20, XP Home/SP3.
Thanks.

If files already have been downloaded then you need to remove the files in the updates and updates\0 folder.<br />
You can delete active-update.xml and updates.xml as well if present.
C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Local Settings\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Mozilla Firefox\updates
(%USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Mozilla Firefox)
If there are problems with updating then best is to download the full version and uninstall the currently installed version.
Download a fresh Firefox copy and save the file to the desktop.
* Firefox 6.0.x: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/all.html
* Uninstall your current Firefox version.
* Do not remove personal data when you uninstall the current version.
Remove the Firefox program folder before installing that newly downloaded copy of the Firefox installer.
* It is important to delete the Firefox program folder to remove all the files and make sure that there are no problems with files that were leftover after uninstalling.
Your bookmarks and other profile data are stored elsewhere in the Firefox Profile Folder and won't be affected by a reinstall, but make sure that you do not select to remove personal data if you uninstall Firefox.

Can I get rid of Exchange with the new Server just released?

Hi, I saw the new 8 core machine and all the programs. I also recieved an email from Apple telling me about all the calendaring it has.
I want to get rid of Exchange. I have Outlook on 99.9% the clients, however, and they're not going to get rid of Windows or Office any time soon. Will the new server just released and the server software do Exchange server calendaring, scheduling, etc. just like (or better) than Exchange does?
Thanks.

iCalServer uses the new standard CalDAV protocol for calendaring. Exchange uses MS's own proprietary protocols - we do not have those implemented in iCalServer. As a result your existing Outlook users can't use iCalServer right now.
The good news is that there is at least one group working on a plugin for Outlook that will enable access to iCalServer. Whilst this is still alpha quality right now progress is being made, and hopefully in the near future thee will be something usable. See <http://openconnector.org>.

How can i get a video file with subtitle out of DVD Studio Pro?

i got a project for a dvd in dvd studio pro. There are subtitles which i created within dvd studio pro.
Now i want make a web version of the video with the subtitle, how can i get to this?

Hi Mr. Cutter,
There is an app called "D-Subtitler for Mac" (as well as several others)
which should allow you to extract the subtitles from a copy of the
finished dvd and use them otherwise.
It's been awhile since I had to do it but it is a fairly common need
so the software exists.
J>H<L

Where can I get complete INSTANCECONFIG file with all possible tags?

Can any one provide me the complete instanceconfig file with all possible tags?
Thanks,
Zubair.

Zubair- you should distribute points to the fellow OTNers who helped to answer your question (mark their answers as correct or helpful - just a forum etiquette)

Can I get my personal files off of macbook pro not booting?!

So my MacBook Pro June 2012 has pretty much died in a sense. I was using it today and kept getting error messages and my apps kept quitting for no reason. So naturally I restarted my computer...well now it won't start up. I get to the Apple logo and a bar comes up underneath it. The bar fills about an eighth of the way before it shuts down. I tried running disk utility to repair it but that didn't work. Then I tried running it in safe mode and that didn't work. I also have come to the attention that Disk Warrior doesn't work on this particular model of MacBook. Now when I go to disk utility I can clearly see that there is space taken up on the hard drive and I can get to the directories with all my personal files, but I cannot access them. My question here is how can I get these files onto an external hard drive before I have to wipe the thing clean. These files are very important to me so I need to exhaust every option before abandoning ship. They have to still be there if I can see them right?

damage data? NO
just
A: dont squeeze top to bottom the HD....
B: try not to touch the green circuit board on the HD
C; dont shake or drop (eeek) the HD.
Very easy to do.
Get a GOOD HD enclosure, junky ones are more common than snowflakes in January
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anker-2-5-Inch-USB-3-0-eSATA-to-SATA-Hard-Drive-Disk-HDD -External-Enclosure-/321085534744?pt=US_Drive_Enclosures_Docks&hash=item4ac23072 18
See this on HOW to install it, takes 10 seconds, easier than falling down:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLNv8RMzfjo

Can't get rid of file in Trash

I know that others have posted similar problems about the Trash not emptying, but this one seems peculiar (to me, that is).
I dump a file into the Trash, so that it is the only file in there. I 'Empty Trash', as per usual.
The original file is no longer visible in the Trash, as expected, but there is still a file there. It is zero KB in size, and is described as an alias. This I get from looking at the Trash contents in list(?) view. When I either click on 'More Info' or drag the file from the trash onto the Desktop, it simply disappears.
It looks weird, as you can see
The stuff underneath the icon is a jumble of what look like coloured pixels, with no discernable letters visible.
This behaviour has just started, and because it is so odd I'm concerned to rectify it.
Any ideas?
Message was edited by: Rod Fryer

Hi JS. I have tried 'Secure Empty Trash', but it doesn't seem to work. The 'doesn't seem' might sound indecisive, but here's what happens:
A small window with the blue Aqua progress bar appears, as if there were a large amount to delete. It mentions 'Items to delete: 5', then after a short pause the window closes. I haven't seen 5 items in the Trash so far when confronted with this problem, only the one. The Trash itself still displays as 'Trash full'. It still has only the one item in it.
When I look at the Trash contents in column view, and highlight the offending item, it's simply described as an Alias, Zero KB on disk. When I click on the More info ... button the Trash empties, the icon disappears. If I then subsequently put anything in the Trash, and empty it, the weird icon reappears. Another way of making it disappear is to drag it out of the Trash onto the Desktop.
I realise that maybe I should have used the word file instead of icon in the above.
As Kappy suggests, it seems to be a Windows relic surfacing in the Mac OS. I'm now wondering if it's anything to do with Fusion as well. I do have Fusion installed and do use it.
I'm lost with all this at present.

How can I get a movie file with no cmpression?

When I export the sequence in fcp, will I get a full resolution( no compressed image) if it's set on dv/dvcpro?
also, if I bring this file to toast, how I do know I am compressing it or not since toast makes a dvd anyway?
thank you!

if I bring this file to toast, how I do know I am compressing it or not since toast makes a dvd anyway?
I'm not sure if I understand your question's syntax, but let's assume you want to make a DVD-Video of your program. In doing so, the video and audio will need to be compressed rather heavily (depending on program length/bit rate). Toast, iDVD, Compressor and DVD-SP will all handle the compression/encoding, but among all of those, Toast has one of the lowest quality encoding outputs.
I'd recommend using a Compressor (for compressing/encoding) and DVD-SP (for authoring and burning) workflow for maintaining the best quality.
-DH

Can't get rid of folder with !

Here's the long story. I bought this ipod off ebay. I got it today and connected it to my computer. I was trying to configure it once it said it was done I tried adding some songs to it. Not using itunes, using just the removeable E: drive like I did with any other MP3 player. It said that it went on.. but once I tried to reconfigure to my computer it would be connected and then drop off. Showing me the folder with the ! and then the battery with the !. I am now atempting to charge it but I know it is not charging only because I don't see anything on the screen. No flashing battery with a lightening bolt. PLEASE HELP!!
Thank you.

Brandy,
This is going to be of limited help but something is better than nothing. I am having a similar problem and got mine to charge by putting it into disk mode before connecting the charger. Mine will only charge in disk mode. This will at least get it ready for more touble shooting.

Mac app store, can't get rid of an app that I did not buy and it's listed under an unknown Apple ID

Hello guys, I have a very rare issue with my Mac App Store application.
Whenever I want to make an update of a piece of software that I've bought, Angry Birds apears as if I had it, when I haven't.
The thing is, I want angry birds to desappear from my updates list taking in account that it does not belong to me.
Beforehand very much
Francisco López

A stranger's Apple ID appears on your Mac in conjunction with an update notice -
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-5261

I was using the 4oD app on my iPod touch and when I went to watch something on it it froze my internet access and I can't get rid of the message "This movie could not be played". How do I fix this???

Please help!!

Have you tried resetting the iPod. Nothing will be lost.
Reset iPod touch: Hold down the On/Off button and the Home button at the same time for at
least ten seconds, until the Apple logo appears.

"at" command line broken in 10.10.3? I get "at: cannot regain privs: Operation not permitted"

After updating to Yosemite 10.10.3, I notice that I can't use the "at" command from the command line in my account. I get the error:
at: cannot regain privs: Operation not permitted
It does seem to work if I sudo, but I have some scripts which I don't want to change.
I don't need to do this very often, so something else other than the 10.10.3 update may have triggered this problem.
Solution?

Linc,
I tried creating the at.allow file, and it didn't help. It still gives me the same error message. Any other ideas?

Can't get rid of files with sudo rm: Operation not permitted?!?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for