How to get rid of bad chrs?

[rikona]

On Tue, 3 Aug 2021 10:28:58 +0200
Liam Proven <lproven at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 3 Aug 2021 at 06:16, rikona <rikona at sonic.net> wrote:
> >
> > It may depend on how the pix were obtained from the phone/comp. I've
> > been using a direct USB connection for ages, and I guess it just
> > copies all. Several pgms now offer to connect to the camera/phone
> > and get pix, and they may only transfer the non-hidden files.
> >
> > A direct copy gives something like:
> > IMG_E6064.JPG but also has
> > .IMG_E6064.JPG
> > It's not hard to get rid of the . files, and I've done that, but if
> > I'm getting 5000 pix from some phone, with several dirs, it's a
> > PITA.  
> 
> Prefixing a filename with a dot hides it on traditional xNix
> filesystems.
> 
> Mac OS X is a UNIX™, certified by the Open Group.
> 
> It creates a hidden dotfile  for every visible file. This is where it
> stores metadata about the file -- what app created it, what app(s) can
> edit it, and so on. Traditional xNix has no way of storing this info;
> it does not track it, but the rich Mac desktop does.
> 
> On Classic MacOS the filesystem kept very rich metadata because the
> Classic MacOS uses no config files _at all_ anywhere. Not a single
> one. It's _all_ in the metadata. For this, the HFS and later HFS+
> filesystems have 2 "forks" for every file: one contains the file's
> traditional contents as seen by other OSes, and the other contains its
> metadata, including what computer it was created on, its Creator and
> Editor application lists, its icons at various sizes, and much more.
> 
> There's no space for this in other OSes' filesystems. NTFS can handle
> it by saving the resource fork in an NTFS Stream, but only if the file
> was saved on an NT server by a Mac connected over the AppleShare
> protocol.
> 
> FAT can't do it at all, not can extX, XFS, Btrfs, etc.
> 
> So, Mac OS X -- a UNIX which ran Classic MacOS apps and which boots on
> Macs from a Classic MacOS filesystem -- makes these hidden files to
> keep the data that on those apps' original native OS was in the
> resource fork.
> 
> On other OSes you can remove them but if you then read the file on a
> Mac again, it will have "forgotten" a bunch of info about the file.
> 
> This is normal standard behaviour for OS X and has been for 21 years
> or so now.
> 
> I know Ralf uses an iPad; iPads and iPhones also run a derivative of
> Mac OS X but without the desktop shell. I therefore would think they
> create the same metadata hidden files.

Thanks for that detailed and interesting description. It was not at all
clear to me why files also had a dot file as well. And I was more
interested in getting rid of them than finding out why they were there.
:-)