Hidden fIles display?

I just go an iMac and connected a Maxtor external HD to it and a MuVo MP3 player. Everything is OK but when I open these devices the file structure shows me what seem to be Hidden Files....Resource Fork, etc.
I don't want to see that when I click on the HD. I just want to see the normal files without the excess pollution of visual space.
So far I have not been able to locate any preference which would allow me to hide these files from view...like Don't show Hidden Files.
Can someone help?

Neil,
This is why I like these discussion pages. If you take the time to look around and be patient you will generally find the answer to the problem.
In my case my Macbook Pro crashed unexpectedly and on getting it going again for some really strange reason there were hidden files from all corners of its Universe on display including all of the root files and even hidden files on the desktop. Really strange and I was in a state of panic having had to do a rebuild about 2 weeks ago and thinking "oh dear, here we go again". To make matters worse the program icons and/or shortcuts everywhere were kind of light coloured.
I followed a process described in the help files which involved using the "Mac OS X Install Disk" and navigating to to some deep dark place on the install DVD and finally running a "sudo" command. It didn't fix the problem.
Your script worked perfectly (once I had fixed the typos) and for that I am eternally grateful. I have saved a copy, just in case.
I still don't understand what happened to make all the hidden files unexpectedly visible but no doubt someone such as yourself would be able to offer a technical explanation.
Man, if I could award you a star I would.
Thanks heaps.
Chris

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Hi there - I've just purchased OSX 5.6 (which is the highest OS I can get for a pre Intel machine I believe) but before it comes I was just doing a general tidy up. When linking my computer to an old G4 PowerBook (using OS9 don't ask why), once mounted I noticed some folders on the desktop of my G5 that do not show up normally. (I can only view them after mounting the G5 PPC onto the G4 PowerBook and looking on there). The folder names are all proceeded by a "." +which I think indicates a hidden file+. I know that there normally are very important files that are purposely hidden and are vital to the OS (e.g. ".DS_Store" etc.) but these particular folders do not seem to be in that category after investigation.
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The Fetch people have been back to me already - not bad huh? - and had the following to say:
"+Hi Deane,+
+I'm not sure where those folders are coming from, but I can tell you that they aren't created by Fetch - nothing Fetch does would create such folders. So no, we don't think they are partially downloaded files.+
+I would be a little careful before deleting them. They could just be an artifact of how the Mac OS X file system looks to Mac OS 9; it could be that they are not real copies of files, but just pointers (aliases) to other files on your disk, so deleting the folders and their contents might unexpectedly delete files you really want to keep on your Mac. I would make sure that is not the case before deleting a lot of them; you might want to delete one file you're sure you don't care about first.+
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+* Open the Applications folder.+
+* Open the Utilities folder.+
+* Open the Terminal application.+
+* At the prompt, type:+
+defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles YES+
+* And then press the Return key.+
+* Then go to the Apple menu and Log Out, or Restart your Mac, for the changes to take effect.+
+Unfortunately showing the hidden folders has a variety of other side effects (such as making all your icons look washed out), so you'll probably only want to do this so you can investigate, and then turn it off again.+
+You can turn it off by following the exact same steps as above, except type NO instead of YES after "AppleShowAllFiles".+
+I hope this helps.+
Thanks,"
Pretty much backs up what you wrote in your first post but I think I'll try the route you suggest in your second and tuck them away somewhere for a week or so to see what happens. If all goes well I'll be back to credit your answer with a solved.
Cheers for the help - Deano

Re: Qosmio G - Hidden files and folders not showing

Hi folks, I have some hidden files and folders, which I was able to access before, and I used to click on the 'organise tab', view, Advanced Settings, show hidden files and folders, in order to hide or show the files.
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Hi aaz911,
First of all it would be nice from you if you post more informations about your notebook model and operating system. This should be done always to get a detailed answer.
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I don't know how I did it, but I managed to hide some folders on an external hard drive plugged into my iMac.
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Hi..
Simple, maybe not, but:
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I found out there are two types of hidden files in Mac. the ones that being with "." (unix based) and the ones that have an invisibility attribute for the meta of the file (folders like /usr, /bin, /tmp, /etc).
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Hidden fIles display?

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