Macintosh HD icon is not on my Desktop or visible from the Finder

Wow, the D attribute is truly bizarre. I haven't seen that one. In the "old" version of the bug the visible attribute was sporatically reset on drive (both internal and external) and folders (including both the Applications folder and the user's home folder), and very rarely on other folders and even files. There has also been a rash of the B (bundle bit) being reset, which I suspect is related. I think, but couldn't swear, that I had some file which got the C (custom icon) bit set.

In doing research for the article I wrote the first instance I found of the visible bit being reset was one problem with it in 10.3.9, but it didn't show up again until Tiger, whereupon it began to be increasingly common (after the third or fourth instance of helping someone with it I decided to write it up).

The D attribute? Now that's strange.
Francine


Francine
Schwieder

Hi Paul,

I've got exactly the same problem on my MacBook running 10.5. It started happening when I upgraded or shortly afterwards. My primary HD disappeared from my desktop and from the finder. Based on your posts I've now disabled Spotlight indexing and changed the attributes on my HD back. I like spotlight so I would really like to get a permanent fix for this bug so I can re-enable spotlight - did you hear back from apple? what is the bug ID?

Thanks for finding the problem - it was driving me nuts!

Luke

At the moment, I have recovered the hard drive icon. Might have to take care to use a current big icon symbol. That might be the issue?

I used (free download) Rage Macintosh Explorer.

I can see the Macintosh HD icon, and using the getinfo command (apple I)--I can check the visible box. now it sorta disappeared a couple of times, so while the info menu was open in Mac Explore---I used the above "path" contextual menu and made certain it sees the Macintosh HD icon, no longer greyed out.

Hope this continues to be visible. I tried a few logouts and restarts.

This happened on my power Book after I erased my obsolete backup Silver keepr stuff from Lacie drive.

Dang, this is irritatinga nd certainly must be unnecessary!

Hi guys.
So, after this, what we do? I have same problem, my Macintosh HD disappared, and it's setting to invisible...
We just waiting for leopard 1.5.1 to solve this problem?

thanks to all for this great support

Well, if you, like Paul, can not get the SetFile command to "stick" you can always make an alias of the invisible hard drive and put the alias on your Desktop:

1. Launch Terminal and type the command:

open /

2. The invisible startup drive will open in a Finder window

3. Hold down the Option and Command keys, click and hold the little proxy icon in the Finder windows toolbar and drag to the Desktop--there will be a little curvy alias sign on your cursor if you are doing it right--and when you see the drive's name and the curvy alias arrow on the Desktop release the mouse button

You'll then have an alias to the startup drive on the Desktop that you can double click to open the drive and see its contents, just like always.
Francine


Francine
Schwieder

Thanks Francine for your "flash" support 🙂
I already make this trick yesterday, but I hope that this is a temporary solution for Macintosh HD invisible icon's problem...

I hope...

Excuse me for my bad english...

Having the same exact problem on my PowerBook G4. It started happening after I upgraded to QuickTime 7.3 and iTunes 7.5; at least, that's when I think it started happening on my 10.5 machine. I never had this under Tiger.

There are a few other discussions going on re: this bug.

I don't normally keep the main hard disk icon on my desktop, but I do keep it in my sidebar. Since the drive is constantly being tagged as invisible, I can't see it in Open/Save dialog boxes.

Great work in discovering that Spotlight is the culprit! Not sure how this one slipped past QA, but here's hoping that it'll be fixed in 10.5.1.

Richard,

The same thing just happened to me about 3 days ago. I installed the updates and restarted. Now my HD is MIA. I cant see any of my applications in finder and I cant follow any of the instructions above because I cant get into anything. This is the most stressful.

There are at least three ways to "get into" things:

1. Follow my instruction above to put an alias on the Desktop
2. Use Spotlight, for instance, to open the Applications folder, just type Applications and will appear in the Folders sub-section
3. Use the Finder's Go menu, select the "Go to Folder.." option, and type in the path to whatever you want, thus /Applications and hit the Go button

In the Save and Open dialog boxes there should be a list of places you've already been, you can use them, or you can type something into the Search box and proceed from there.
Francine


Francine
Schwieder

Anyone know if the 10.5.1 update fixes this issue?

You might try going into finder preferences, clicking on the general tab and make sure that the box is checked to show hard disk.

crackedbeak, that is not the issue. The Finder preferences are set 100% correctly. What's happening is that the "invisible" attribute is constantly being set to "True" on the drive, usually within one minute or less of setting back to false.

To change this, you need the developer tools or an AppleScript; I've been using the developer tools. Specifically, this command to set the drive back to visible:

sudo SetFile -a v /

The lowercase "v" in the command tells the system to set the invisible attribute to "false", an uppercase "V" would be "true".

That works for a short time, until another process comes along and resets the attribute again. Bug reports have been filed with Apple, and hopefully, 10.5.2 will fix the problem (10.5.1 does not fix it).

-Richard

" Bug reports have been filed with Apple, and hopefully, 10.5.2 will fix the problem (10.5.1 does not fix it)"

Oh man...I don't believe that Apple don't fix that problem.... I download 1.5.1 and.. yes,Macintosh HD is set to invisible....

when 1.5.2. come out? Probably one month.... or two??... it's incredible what Apple doing...

However I make a trick to set Macintosh HD visible: with Rage Macinthosh Explorer I set Macintosh HD to visible, then I log out and log in with my account. With this little trick now I can have HD in desktop and in Finder...
I hope that this one can help someone else...

Message was edited by: GªM€