Folder disappears when you try to open certain sub-folders

Question

When double clicking certain sub-folders, the main folder disappears and returns to the desktop. I repaired permissions with Disk Utility and it had no effect. Also verified the disk and it was okay.
I also am getting an "Unable to read file" message on an Excel file that I had no problem opening a couple of months ago. Don't know if this is related or not.
iMac 2 Ghz Intel Core Duo   Mac OS X (10.4.9)  

Answer 1

Hi Daniel,
This issue is a fairly common occurrence, and reasons of the problems are variously. We can narrow the reasons down as much as possible.
Please refer to this article, I think the methods of this article are more specific.
http://blogs.technet.com/b/the_microsoft_excel_support_team_blog/archive/2012/05/14/the-definitive-locked-file-post.aspx
And try these solutions step by step. Above all, you should
 pay attention to the third solution ” Turn off the Preview Pane, Details Pane and pop ups that show information about file and desktop items”, make sure you have unchecked “Show pop-up description for folder and desktop items”.
If you finish all of methods from this article, the problem still exists. Checking the permissions of users.
For instance, the permission of user 1 is only read and he opens the [shared] file, the document creates a temporary file in the same directory as the original file. Thus the document gets a temporary lock file. When other users open the [shared]
file again, they get the error message “file in use”.
If you want to verify the reason of permission, checking the temporary file. This is a hidden file and it will be the same name as your document, but prefixed with a ~$ symbols.
The easiest way out is to delete the temporary file, but this not a long-term solution. Checking the permissions of users is radically.
Trying these solutions and let me know if they work. I am glad to help and forward to your reply.
Best Regards,
Emi