Show/Hide Hidden Files on Mac OSX

How to Show Hidden Files on OSX

  1. Launch Terminal
  2. Type in “defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true” (without the quotes, pay attention to the capital letters) at the command prompt, right after the dollar sign.
  3. Restart the Finder by typing in “killall Finder” minus the quotes and be sure to capitalize Finder. You can also restart the Mac OS X Finder by clicking the Apple on the upper left of the screen and selecting “Force Quit.” Click on “Finder” and hit the “Relaunch” button.
  4. Open up a Finder window by going to the Dock and clicking on the Finder icon.
  5. See that there are now files with a dot (or period) in front of them like “.Trash” and others. You can also create hidden files yourself by naming them with a dot in front of the filename.

How to Re-hide Hidden Files

  1. Launch Terminal.
  2. Type in “defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool false” (without the quotes, this is case sensitive) at the command prompt.
  3. Relaunch the finder by typing in “killall Finder” without the quotes and remembering the case sensitivity. Open a new Finder window. Those files that had the dot preceding the file name are hidden again.
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