file removal problem

[ubuntu at rio.vg]

R Kimber wrote:
> 
> a third file, word.png, is listed by ls in the directory,
> but ls -l word.png gives
> 
> ls: word.png: Input/output error
> 

This is a very bad sign.  It's not a matter of permissions or any of
that.  This usually means that your disk has been damaged in some way.
Assuming that it's not a bad cable or something, sometimes it can be
repaired with fsck.  In my experience, most of the time it means it's
time to buy a new hard drive and get whatever data you can off the one
giving I/O errors.  Take a look at /var/log/messages and/or dmesg.