Oh my goodness! How did you get on?
Was anything recoverable? On Aug 24, 2:35 pm, Chris Staples <[email protected]> wrote: > Thanks for the info Sam, > > A sorry tale that highlights the need for regular backing up. I always add > that it has to be a better option to save an attachment rather than dragging > it out of the mail, at least then you get the opportunity to re-name the > file. As you say it is highly unusual to see a file without a numeric or > letter based name. I can only imagine he had unwittingly highlighted all the > characters before the dot and pressed the delete button? > > Good luck with the salvage operation. > > Chris > > On 24 Aug 2011, at 10:16, Sam - MacAmbulance wrote: > > > > > > > > > Hi All > > > My client has just suffered an extremely bad case of data loss caused by > > Parallels Tools, serious enough for me to warn you all in the hope that you > > never get caught out by it. > > > A client of his emailed him a powerpoint presentation and, for whatever > > reason, the filename consisted only of a single dot (I can hear the UNIX > > geeks beginning to cry now). He dragged the attachment to his desktop and > > it crashed Windows Explorer. He dragged the attachment to his OS X desktop > > and again the machine crashed. He restarted to find that his entire Desktop > > folder had been wiped. Unfortunately for him he had several hundred GB of > > files on his Desktop, including his Parallels Virtual Machine file (don't > > ask!). > > > For the uninitiated, every folder on a Mac has two invisible files within > > it. A file with two dots as the name ".." and a file with one dot ".", two > > dots denotes the parent folder, a single dot denotes 'this folder'. By > > dragging an item with a single dot into a folder, you essentially replace > > 'this folder' with the contents of the single dot file. > > > Quite why his client named the file just "." is beyond me; How his computer > > allowed him to do so is another thing entirely. As an average user, my > > client would've had absolutely no idea of the importance of the . and .. > > files, so would never know the consequences of replacing them. It's only > > lucky the file wasn't named ".." or he would've lost his entire home > > folder, replacing the parent folder of Desktop! > > > The really important question is why didn't Parallels Tools warn him of the > > impending replacement of the folder he was dragging this file into? I tried > > to replicate the bug in Outlook 2011 for Mac, saving the "." attachment to > > a folder on the freshly wiped Desktop, I was warned "this will replace the > > folder 'test', are you sure you want to do this". > > > I haven't tried it with VMWare Fusion so not sure if it's purely a bug > > transferring the files between operating systems. It's also a fairly > > obscure situation as I've never seen anyone able to name a file simply "." > > in all my years of being a nerd. > > > Unfortunately, in this case, my client's Parallels Virtual Machine file was > > over 100GB, so we had excluded it from Time Machine to keep from filling up > > the backup drive (with semi-regular manual backups to a different disk, not > > done by the client since Nov 2010). Ironically his Time Machine backup had > > also been complaining about free space and had been unable to back up for > > over a month (which he informed me of only this morning). > > > So, it's off I go to attempt to recover anything i can from the deleted > > space on the drive, then recover from his Time Machine backup and restore > > his copy of Windows from a year ago. > > > MacBook Pro > > OS X 10.6.8 > > Parallels 6 latest build as of last week > > 500GB hard drive > > > What a difference a dot makes………………… > > > Sam > > MacAmbulance > > Providing affordable Apple & PC services > > > Sam Mullen > > 07747 778022 > >http://www.macambulance.co.uk > > [email protected] > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "Sussex Mac User Group" group. > > To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > > [email protected]. > > For more options, visit this group > > athttp://groups.google.com/group/smug?hl=en-GB. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Sussex Mac User Group" group. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/smug?hl=en-GB.
