USB Storage - deleting files

Chris Jeffries chris at candm.org.uk
Wed Sep 17 05:30:38 UTC 2008


On Tue, 2008-09-16 at 22:23 +0100, ubuntu-users-request at lists.ubuntu.com
wrote:
> Re: USB Storage - deleting files

Thanks for the comments guys. All are worth remembering. However I would
still like to know how the device got to be read-only, and how
connecting it to a Windows PC cleared the fault.

In brief, after various (inappropriate) attempts to delete using
Nautilus (that bit is now SOLVED - Thanks guys) - the USB mass storage
device got flagged as being read-only.

For example rm on Ubuntu was giving ´Device is read-only' messages.
After trying various changes of ownership, and permissions with no
progress, I unplugged the device, plugged it into a Windows PC deletd
the trash files and then plugged it back into the UBUNTU PC (During this
time I left UBUNTU running). When I plugged it back into the UBUNTU
machine, the problem had gone away. The device was now read/writable.

At the moment I cannot recreate the read only effect, but next time I
do, I will try unplugging the device from UBUNTU PC and then plugging it
back in (without going to a MS Windows PC), in case it was that that
cleared it, and not the plugging into MS Windows.

If I get any news on that front I will report. In the meantime, if
anyone has any idea HOW the device might have become read only, I would
love to know - and also whether there might have been a way to make it
read write without resorting to MS (for example, I did not tinker with
the dev attributes, only the media ones.)

Chris.





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