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All replies
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Helpful answers
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Nov 15, 2014 8:56 PM in response to thomas_r.by Cauldie,I explained the situation with my instructor at a school. He gave me the files back, I put them on the flash drive, and when I got home, they were fine. I should have all of my files on the flash drive backed up on my computer. I will give it a go (reformatting) when I'm feeling risky. Thanks for all of your help and time with this situation.
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Feb 22, 2015 4:48 AM in response to Cauldieby mattaustin77,Hi Cauldie,
I just had the same problem where my folders have turned into exec files. You said in your thread that your instructor managed to fix your folders? I don't suppose you know how he/she did it do you? I am at a loss as to what to do and unfortunately these folders are of high importance to me - 4 years of work!
Any help would be very much appreciated
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Apr 25, 2015 7:12 PM in response to thomas_r.by Don-16,Hey this exactly what happened to my files. I don't know what to do ??? please help
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Jun 29, 2015 2:56 PM in response to nigilinaby petermac87,That appears to be a Windows .exe file which cannot be opened by OS X. If you have Windows installed on your Mac as well, then boot up in Windows and try opening it.
Pete
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Jun 29, 2015 3:12 PM in response to nigilinaby Kurt Lang,Well, it's 6.4 MB of something, but the name has been truncated. Please post the entire name of the file here.
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Jul 13, 2015 10:19 AM in response to thomas_r.by Polushenie,Hey. I have the same problem with very important folders and files on my flash drive, as well as folders on an SD card, turning into exec files with the extension .Ink. I can't open them on my Mac but I was able to open them on a PC. Is the problem with my Mac or with the flash drive & SD card? And if I need to, how do I reformat the devices? Please help!!
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Jul 13, 2015 10:24 AM in response to Polushenieby Kurt Lang,It means what you copied from the PC to the flash drive weren't the actual files, but symbolic links. They don't point to anything when you try to open them from the Mac, not to mention OS X doesn't know what those files are for in the first place. On the PC, it can read in the .lnk file where the real files reside and open them.
So if you need to get the files over to the Mac, you need to copy the actual files onto the flash drive. From Windows, right click on each .lnk file and choose Properties. Part of the information will show you exactly what drive and folder the file resides on.
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Jul 13, 2015 12:28 PM in response to Kurt Langby Polushenie,No.
My question was in line with the original thread question about files created on Macs suddenly turning into exec files; specifically in response to thomas_r's comment about files/folders and .Ink extensions.
My folder and files were created on a Mac and saved to a flash drive that I use all the time. The only time a PC was involved was to test if the flash drive and SD card files would open, after they had turned to exec files. Which they did on the PC.
I still need to know
A) how to recover these files for my Mac
B) if this is a sign the files have been corrupted by a device
C) what corrupted the files
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Jul 13, 2015 12:49 PM in response to Polushenieby Kurt Lang,Okay, but I had to guess. You didn't say which computer you originally used to write the files to the flash drive. Just that they were .lnk files and you couldn't open them on the Mac, but could on the PC.
You may have a issue on the Windows side that hides the actual files and creates the .lnk files. See this topic. Essentially, the real files get a hidden attribute applied to them. The command given by jack4all unhides all items on the target drive. So if the flash drive appears as drive E: when mounted in Windows, you would type in:
attrib -h -r -s /s /d e:\*.*
It's possible you have a virus in Windows that's causing this. It's certainly nothing that would happen otherwise. Windows doesn't do that by itself. You can kind of confirm that by doing a Properties on a .lnk file while it's plugged into Windows. If it says the .jpg file (or whatever file type it is) is on the flash drive, then that's what happened. The real file was hidden and a .lnk file created. Why anyone would write a virus to do this, I don't know.
You could also test it on the Mac side. To view all files on your Mac, open the Terminal and enter the following two lines, pressing Enter after each one.
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
killall Finder
This will allow you to see all hidden files and folders on all drives. When you're done, type in the same two lines, except change TRUE to FALSE to return file viewing to normal.
If you can now see the real files (they'll be shown in gray text to denote they're hidden objects), then you very likely have that virus on your Windows computer.
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Jul 13, 2015 4:14 PM in response to Polushenieby thomas_r.,Polushenie wrote:
A) how to recover these files for my Mac
The easiest answer would be if you had a backup of those files. If you don't, remember, any file that you don't have a backup of, regardless of where it's stored, is a file that WILL be lost eventually. It's just a matter of when.
Kurt's right on track regarding recovering them from the drive. That may be possible, depending on what malware caused the problem. The originals may just be in a hidden folder on that drive, or they may have been encrypted to prevent you from recovering them. Which is the case, we can't say.
C) what corrupted the files
That one's easy, this was the work of Windows malware. There's malware out there that is known to replace all the files on an external drive with .lnk files. Usually, the purpose is to spread the malware (when you connect the drive to another Windows machine and open one of the files, boom... that machine is infected too), though it could also be for the purpose of ransom. Any Windows computers you have connected that drive to may be infected. Fortunately, your Mac is not susceptible to this malware.
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Jul 15, 2015 10:10 AM in response to thomas_r.by Polushenie,Thanks for the info thomas_r and Kurt Lang.
I tried Kurt's commands on my Mac and the 'true' command showed me all the real files and folders grayed out, as well as showing all the .Ink files as clickable. Once I did the 'false' command, the grayed out files disappeared again and only .Ink files remained.
I guess this means the real files are not recoverable?
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Jul 15, 2015 10:47 AM in response to Polushenieby Kurt Lang,No, you can recover them. They're still on the flash drive, just hidden.
The first command above simply makes all files in OS X visible, including those with a hidden attribute. The 'false' command tells the OS to behave normally again and not allow you to see files and folders you aren't supposed to. Many users have found various methods to show all files in OS X, and then proceed to destroy their systems by deleting everything they don't recognize and have convinced themselves shouldn't be there.
Plug the flash drive in so it appears on the desktop. Go to the /Applications/Utilities/ folder and launch Terminal. Enter this string:
chflags nohidden *
Do not press enter yet. Put a space after the asterisk, then drag and drop the icon of the flash drive from the desktop into the Terminal window. It will fill in the path name. Now press enter. All files on the drive should now be visible and you can copy your data to your desktop or other location.


