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A couple of months ago the hard disk on my Mackbook Pro (2017...usb c ports) was getting full so I transferred files to a seagate external drive.
This morning when i opened that external drive almost everything comes up as an alias file. How to I open these files?
Thanks for your help, I have no idea what to do. The original files were deleted from the laptop hard drive.
Thanks for your help.
WA
MacBook Pro 15", macOS 10.13
How to I open these files?
An alias is a pointer to the original file. If that original is gone there is nothing to open.
Select the file then select the Finder's File menu > Show Original. What happens?
How to I open these files?
An alias is a pointer to the original file. If that original is gone there is nothing to open.
Select the file then select the Finder's File menu > Show Original. What happens?
Oh interesting... I will do some investigation. I wondered if it was the dodgy usb-c port on my laptop that caused the problem.
When I followed your instructions Finder>show original I get this message.
When dragging an icon from one volume to another, the Finder's default behavior is to create a copy, not an alias. I don't know why it created an alias instead.
I seem to recall some obscure Finder "defaults write" setting capable of overriding that behavior though. Some Seagate "drive management" software might be responsible. That is merely a guess, and I think it's highly unlikely, but it might be worth investigating.
That message confirms your worst suspicion—the original is gone.
If they're in the Trash and you didn't empty the Trash, retrieving them is easy enough. If you already emptied the Trash though, things get a lot more difficult. Data recovery software is an option but I don't have anything in particular to recommend.
I rather doubt the problem is a dodgy USB port; of course I realize that doesn't help.
Thank you, I was afraid of that :( but I do thank you for confirming this for me.
Kind regards,
WA
Aliases
