replace folders sucks

[scottbass]

I copied a large series of folders from my Macbook Pro hard disk to an external disk. I copied it one level too high in the backup hard disk folder structure.

So I dragged it down to to the correct folder, and Finder asked if I wanted to replace the contents. Well, yeah, I wanted like named items to replace the old items, since they were likely just duplcates of the same files anyway.

I didn't expect it to frickin' delete the entire contents of my backup folder!!!

Of course, there is no copy of the old folders in the trash. And no, I don't have a backup of my backup folders.

This has to be the dumbest UI decision Apple ever implemented. I've seen many posts of Apple users complaining about this behaviour. Glad to see Apple is listening to its users...not.

"It just works". Yeah, a nice marking slogan...if only it were true.

Questions:

1) Is there ANY way to disable this stupid UI decision in Finder?

2) What's the best replacement for Finder?

3) What's the best replacement for OSX? Windows? Ubuntu? CentOS?



P.S.: It appears Apple doesn't like the word "sucks" on their forum: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5515734.

 

[w0lf]

Yeah I noticed this to. Dunno if this is standard behavior or what but it seems stupid as all hell to me.

 

[Parasprite]

replace (verb) /rəˈpleɪs/
1) take the place of

Makes sense to me.

 

[mingqing007]

I always thoughts replace folders would just remove the duplicate(same name) contents, is it ?

 

[scottbass]

Here is an 11 page thread from 2007 on this issue!

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/274241/

And when the moderator closed off the thread he wasn't even correct:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1508245/

@Parasprite: Try taking off your fanboy hat for just a second...read the above threads...Google "most hated osx mac". Quoting Webster's at me isn't going to convince me, nor the 1000's of other Mac users out there, that Apple's got this one right.

In the meantime, I'm out of around 10GB of files on my backup disk that I'll never recover.

I'm seriously thinking of wiping my OSX partition, expanding my Boot Camp partition, and returning to Windows. All the software I really want to use runs better there anyway (Chrome, Firefox, Beyond Compare, TextPad, etc, etc).

Yeah, I'm pissed...perhaps I should stay away from this thread for a day or three...

 

[w0lf]

Makes sense to me.

Well is there a way to merge and replace old files?

 

[Parasprite]

@Parasprite: Try taking off your fanboy hat for just a second...read the above threads...Google "most hated osx mac". Quoting Webster's at me isn't going to convince me, nor the 1000's of other Mac users out there, that Apple's got this one right.

It's NOAD, actually.

In the meantime, I'm out of around 10GB of files on my backup disk that I'll never recover.

Fanboy answer: Why were you manually copying files to disk instead of using Time Machine?

Non-fanboy answer: I don't know what kind of files you had, but you might have a chance to recover at least some of your data if you run some sort of undelete program ASAP. The only one I've used is Prosoft's Data Rescue (which I obtained through not entirely legitimate means) which I don't expect you to pay for. There might be a similar program that is more/less free if you google "undelete mac", but unfortunately I don't have any specific links to give.

Curious question you don't have to answer - if you were using sequential backups, why was the top-level folder the same name as the folder you were trying to put inside of it? The only logical answer I have would involve two folders named "Untitled folder" which seems kind of odd for an important set of backups.

Well is there a way to merge and replace old files?

Not as far as I know. But I found out if you hold "option" while dragging a folder, it gives you a 3rd option "Don't Replace" which is pretty unhelpful when you think about it; considering that it does the exact same thing as "Stop" (unless you are dragging multiple folders, then you get the 3 options anyways).

 

[scottbass]

It's NOAD, actually.

Thanks for clarifying your version of dictionary.

Fanboy answer: Why were you manually copying files to disk instead of using Time Machine?

A) Because I wanted to. And that reply isn't even related to the subject ;-) Which is that the default action sucks, that you need 3rd party software to merge folders, that Finder is a dinosaur, and that Apple doesn't listen to its users.

B) Because Time Machine isn't the answer for everything. I use it for my system backup, but not for other files which I backup to an external USB drive.

C) The USB drive in question is formatted NTFS. I have the Paragon Drivers so my Mac can write to this drive. I share these files between Windows and Mac - kind of hard to lug my Time Machine to client sites running Windows. This external drive isn't on my backup plan. Yeah, I chance a hard drive failure - what I didn't expect was Finder's behaviour to be different than every other operating system I've used. And in fact, it's different than the mv command from the Terminal!!!

Non-fanboy answer: I don't know what kind of files you had, but you might have a chance to recover at least some of your data if you run some sort of undelete program ASAP. The only one I've used is Prosoft's Data Rescue (which I obtained through not entirely legitimate means) which I don't expect you to pay for. There might be a similar program that is more/less free if you google "undelete mac", but unfortunately I don't have any specific links to give.

Probably doesn't apply given the above. But, you actually did give me an idea. I may be able to go through my Time Machine backups, and restore as many of those files from that one particular directory (and sub-directories) to the external HD. The files tended to remain on my Mac HD for a while (week? month?) before I copied them to the external HD. So I may be able to get some (probably not all) files back to the external HD that way. A massive waste of time for this massively sucky default behaviour (as documented by thousands of other Apple users), but still an option.

Curious question you don't have to answer - if you were using sequential backups, why was the top-level folder the same name as the folder you were trying to put inside of it? The only logical answer I have would involve two folders named "Untitled folder" which seems kind of odd for an important set of backups.

My Mac HD was something like:

Folder/
A/
   B/
   C/
   D/

My external HD was something like:

/Some/Folder/
 A/
   B/
   C/
   D/
   E/
   ...
   Z/

After the copy from my Mac to the external HD, I had

/Some/Folder
   A/
             /A

When I dragged /Some/A to /Some/Folder, I got the prompt, thought it was replacing all like named ***files***, said Ok, and lost all my old contents in that folder and all sub-folders on the external HD. IOW, all old files in A/ - C/ were lost, as well as all sub-folders D/ - Z/.

 

[Parasprite]

C) The USB drive in question is formatted NTFS.

Probably doesn't apply given the above.

Actually it probably applies even more now because I'm certain there is good freeware undelete-type software compatible with or that runs on Windows. I know Hiren's had one included.

Although, as far as I know recovered files don't retain folder structure which may or may not be a complete main in the arse depending on how separated everything was, your option would probably be easier either way but it might at least bridge a few gaps if you can't find anything.

My Mac HD was something like:

[snip]

I'm not entirely certain that it answered my question, but I at least have a concept of how something like that could happen. Thank you for that.

Thanks for clarifying your version of dictionary.

What else would a fanboy like me use, after all it's the dictionary OS X comes with

Seriously though, I hope you can find your files. Losing data is no fun.

 

[scottbass]

I just picked Webster's off the top of my head

Glad we got civil in the end lol

Hopefully Apple will make this mistake harder to do in a future release. But folks have been asking for a change for years, so I won't hold my breath.

One of my favourite applications is Beyond Compare (www.scootersoftware.com). It's great to see they have a Mac version in the works: http://www.scootersoftware.com/support.php?zz=kb_mac It would have helped in this scenario.

I will gladly fork out their license fee once it's developed.

 

[xt8088]

I also had my old folder which contained much more folders/files by the new folder in OS 10.9. Fortunately, I can recover most of the contents, but it wasted so much time!
Actually, I came from Windows camp. Finder really sucks! At least Windows 7 can merge folders without any problem. I don't remember if Windows XP can do this too, having been moved to windows 7 so long ago.