Terminal vs. GUI. Am I seeing everything?

[Arcus]

Ok guys, help me out here. While navigating using terminal it seems that there are more directories and files visible than there is though the GUI. Am I seeing things? If not, is there a way to unhide these files?

 

[jsw]

Terminal lets you see all of the files (including hidden ones, if you search appropriately).

You can get to some of the other files and folders using the "Go to Folder..." command (shift-⌘-G) in Finder and heading for places like "/usr".

However, going to places Finder doesn't normally let you go can cause you to mess up files essential to the proper running of OS X, so I wouldn't do it lightly.

 

[Arcus]

You are officially my hero!! Thats exactly where I needed to go!!

 

[louiek]

Is there any way of getting finder to show these folders. I would love to navigate through /etc, /var, /opt and terminal-only-knows what else is in my root directory using the finder. I've only recently gotten spotlight to index these, which it doesn't do by default.

 

[WildCowboy]

Use TinkerTool to enable viewing of hidden and system files/folders (as well as enable lots of other cool options). But listen to jsw...there's a reason those folders are hidden. Most people have no need to go digging in there and you can really screw things up by mucking around in there.

 

[louiek]

Thank you very much for that WildCowboy, it's exactly what I've been looking for. I'll be careful too, I've never granted my user account admin privelages out of paranoia that I might delete something important.