highlighted file titles

[justcallmejoe]

hello all...
i just upgraded my system to OSX and now i am trying to back up alot of my older work files onto an external hard drive. it is working just fine for some of the files but not for others. some of my file names are highlighted in a green, these files i can pull onto the external, but then if i turn it off and delete the files from my computer, then turn the external back on they also seam to get deleted from there. is there a way to get rid of the link that is happening between these file and the external? why is this happeneing? also some of my other files are highlighted in yellow...what is the meaning of this? hopefully this is an easy problem to fix.
thanks to anyone who can help.

 

[monke]

Either right click or Ctrl click the icon and click a color underneath the title 'Colour Label'

That should do it.

 

[nagromme]

I don't see how such a link could happen.

Are you sure you are copying the files, and not making aliases?

Aliases have a little curly arrow in the corner, and very small file size. But you can't make them by accident: you'd have to hold Cmd-Opt while dragging. (Don't hold that, just drag from one drive to another. Opt alone forces a Copy instead of a Move, but as you can see from the green "+" pointer, Copy is the default when dragging to another drive anyway.)

 

[justcallmejoe]

do the colour labels mean anything, or is it supposed to be a tool that makes finding files easier?
as for not making an alias, its not, it is the file actually copied.
if i have both windows (the one on my computer and the one from the external, if i move the file on the external, the file automatically moves on my computer.

 

[monke]

I misread your first post, but no these colour labels don't mean anything. They are just there so you can group certain things together yourself or find files easier.