How to show hidden files in Finder (OS X 10.9)?

This worked for me and my colleagues:

I was forced to spend some of my precious time looking into this use today and I have now worked it out. The command that everyone is using is correct, but there seem to be some new plist caching being used in Mavericks that is being messed by by the "killall Finder" command. The key is to reboot rather than killall.

To show all the file:

Type the following into a terminal window:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1

Then REBOOT. Do not use the killall Finder command as suggested in other posts.

I got the clue from this post:

http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20130908042828630

What we can see happening is that then we run the defaults command, the finder plist is updated correctly but when the killall command is issued and we recheck the plist, the AppleShowAllFiles line is gone again. I figured that the kill all command must trigger some kind of security in the OS. It probably thinks that Finder has crashed and it refreshes it's plist file from a backup. I guessed that a reboot of the system would gracefully write any caches to where they should be. This seems to be the case.

Excellent! Thank you for this simple, fast fix!

On 10.9, the fix for me was to follow the usual directions, but use 1 instead of YES

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1

killall Finder

Hmm, maybe this has changed since you wrote this, but I found that using TRUE and FALSE works just fine, also with killall Finder.

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE

I am not using killall Finder, but instead ALT-right-click on Finder and click Relaunch, as I almost find that faster. Restarting between showing and hiding hidden files is not something I would call a "solution".

I am using 10.9.2 and it is working flawlessly without the need to reboot.

I have found that logging out and loggin in again works just fine, and itts quicker than restarting.

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That is a really silly username isn't it? To bad Apple wont let me change it :/

Here's also a free app to solve this iisue - Funter. Works from menubar.

You don't have to reboot, just restart the plist caching process.

$ defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1

$ killall cfprefsd

$ killall -9 Finder

I had to manually enter the setting in the plist file.

After running "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1", I opened the file and confirmed that the entry had not been written to the file.

so I entered it manually, then restarted Finder. That finally worked.

I you don´t feel like messing around with terminal, you may just use this little App, which does the same in an easy way.

Visibilitor

Greetings

FliX

Worked first time - in Mavericks. Thanks.

I also read somewhere to go to Finder > File > Find > Kind > Other > File Invisible (check) and also from Kind > File visibility > Visible or Invisible, and it has been mentioned cmd-shift-period.

I wish Apple would stop copying Windows

I you don´t feel like messing around with terminal, you may just use this little App, which does the same in an easy way.

Visibilitor

Greetings

FliX

I went to the above website. I never saw the item referred to. Only advertising.

Did you mean this ?

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/40823/visibility

Look at mine ^. You don't have to type in the terminal. It works. You may have to refresh the finder.

I did read your post. But I got the oppression you weren't sure if it works or not. I'm after something that will permanently make all files visible (you see, my IQ is above 80).