<!DOCTYPE html><htmllang="en-US"><head><metacharset="UTF-8"><metahttp-equiv="X-UA-Compatible"content="IE=Edge"><title>Finder Info - SyncFiles Documentation</title><linkrel="shortcut icon"href="/syncfiles/favicon.ico"type="image/x-icon"><linkrel="stylesheet"href="/syncfiles/assets/css/just-the-docs-default.css"><scripttype="text/javascript"src="/syncfiles/assets/js/vendor/lunr.min.js"></script><scripttype="text/javascript"src="/syncfiles/assets/js/just-the-docs.js"></script><metaname="viewport"content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"><!-- Begin Jekyll SEO tag v2.8.0 --><title>Finder Info | SyncFiles Documentation</title><metaname="generator"content="Jekyll v4.2.2"/><metaproperty="og:title"content="Finder Info"/><metaproperty="og:locale"content="en_US"/><metaname="description"content="Write an awesome description for your new site here. You can edit this line in _config.yml. It will appear in your document head meta (for Google search results) and in your feed.xml site description."/><metaproperty="og:description"content="Write an awesome description for your new site here. You can edit this line in _config.yml. It will appear in your document head meta (for Google search results) and in your feed.xml site description."/><linkrel="canonical"href="https://depp.github.io/syncfiles/tech/finder-info"/><metaproperty="og:url"content="https://depp.github.io/syncfiles/tech/finder-info"/><metaproperty="og:site_name"content="SyncFiles Documentation"/><metaproperty="og:type"content="website"/><metaname="twitter:card"content="summary"/><metaproperty="twitter:title"content="Finder Info"/><scripttype="application/ld+json">{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebPage","description":"Write an awesome description for your new site here. You can edit this line in _config.yml. It will appear in your document head meta (for Google search results) and in your feed.xml site description.","headline":"Finder Info","url":"https://depp.github.io/syncfiles/tech/finder-info"}</script><!-- End Jekyll SEO tag --></head><body><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"style="display: none;"><symbolid="svg-link"viewBox="0 0 24 24"><title>Link</title><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"width="24"height="24"viewBox="0 0 24 24"fill="none"stroke="currentColor"stroke-width="2"stroke-linecap="round"stroke-linejoin="round"class="feather feather-link"><pathd="M10 13a5 5 0 0 0 7.54.54l3-3a5 5 0 0 0-7.07-7.07l-1.72 1.71"></path><pathd="M14 11a5 5 0 0 0-7.54-.54l-3 3a5 5 0 0 0 7.07 7.07l1.71-1.71"></path></svg></symbol><symbolid="svg-search"viewBox="0 0 24 24"><title>Search</title><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"width="24"height="24"viewBox="0 0 24 24"fill="none"stroke="currentColor"stroke-width="2"stroke-linecap="round"stroke-linejoin="round"class="feather feather-search"><circlecx="11"cy="11"r="8"></circle><linex1="21"y1="21"x2="16.65"y2="16.65"></line></svg></symbol><symbolid="svg-menu"viewBox="0 0 24 24"><title>Menu</title><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"width="24"height="24"viewBox="0 0 24 24"fill="none"stroke="currentColor"stroke-width="2"stroke-linecap="round"stroke-linejoin="round"class="feather feather-menu"><linex1="3"y1="12"x2="21"y2="12"></line><linex1="3"y1="6"x2="21"y2="6"></line><linex1="3"y1="18"x2="21"y2="18"></line></svg></symbol><symbolid="svg-arrow-right"viewBox="0 0 24 24"><title>Expand</title><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"width="24"height="24"viewBox="0 0 24 24"fill="none"stroke="currentColor"stroke-width="2"stroke-linecap="round"stroke-linejoin="round"class="feather feather-chevron-right"><polylinepoints="9 18 15 12 9 6"></polyline></svg></symbol><symbolid="svg-doc"viewBox="0 0 24 24"><title>Document</title><svgxmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"width="24"height="24"viewBox="0 0 24 24"fill="none"stroke="currentColor"stroke-width="2"stroke-linecap="round"stroke-linejoin="round"class="feather feather-file"><pathd="M132H6a2200
</code></pre></div></div><h2id="preservation"><ahref="#preservation"class="anchor-heading"aria-labelledby="preservation"><svgviewBox="0 0 16 16"aria-hidden="true"><usexlink:href="#svg-link"></use></svg></a> Preservation </h2><p>When transferring files to old Macintosh systems, it’s usually necessary to assign a correct type code for every file. It can be frustrating to work with files that do not have the correct type code, and you may not be able to open these files at all.</p><p><imgsrc="no-type-code.png"alt="Screenshot of error dialog box, saying that a file could not be opened because the application program that created it could not be found"/></p><p>There are various tools which can fix this problem. ResEdit can fix this problem, and there are some more specialized tools designed specifically to deal with this problem.</p><h2id="type-and-creator-codes"><ahref="#type-and-creator-codes"class="anchor-heading"aria-labelledby="type-and-creator-codes"><svgviewBox="0 0 16 16"aria-hidden="true"><usexlink:href="#svg-link"></use></svg></a> Type and Creator Codes </h2><p>Older versions of Mac OS do not use filename suffixes to associate files with applications. You can use any name you like for a file, and the file type is given by the file’s type code. The application to open it is given by the file’s creator code.</p><p>The type code is a four-character code used to describe the type of the file. For example, <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">TEXT</code> is used for text files, <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">JPEG</code> is used for JPEG images, and <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">APPL</code> is for application programs. File types are used to figure out which applications can open a specific file. For example, SimpleText can open text files, but it refuses to open application programs.</p><p>The creator code is second four-character code used to associate the file with a specific application. For example, SimpleText has the creator code <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">ttxt</code>, and PictureViewer uses creator code <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">ogle</code>. When you double-click on a file in the Finder, the Finder launches the application with the corresponding creator code, if it exists. The creator code for a file also determines what icon it uses in the Finder.</p><p>For example, this screenshot shows three text files in a folder. Each file has the same filename suffix, <codeclass="language-plaintext highlighter-rouge">.c</code>, but that suffix is irrelevant here. Since the files were created with three different programs, they have three different icons—the text file icon for SimpleText files, MPW files, and BBEdit files.</p><p><imgsrc="text-files.png"alt="Screenshot depicting three text files in a Macintosh System 7 folder, created by MPW, BBEdit, and SimpleText"/></p><h2id="location-and-color"><ahref="#location-and-color"class="anchor-heading"aria-labelledby="location-and-color"><svgviewBox="0 0 16 16"aria-hidden="true"><usexlink:href="#svg-link"></use></svg></a> Location and Color </h2><p>You can see that the Finder lets you freely place your files in different locations within a window. You can also assign one of eight different labels to a file or folder—each label corresponds to a specific name and color. The location and color are stored in the Finder info.</p><p>Here is what this looks like System 7. The “Utilities” folder below is given a label which makes the icon red.</p><p><imgsrc="finder.png"alt="Screenshot of a volume in the System 7 Finder, depecting a few folders, where one of the folders is red."/></p><h2id="rebuilding-the-desktop"><ahref="#rebuilding-the-desktop"class="anchor-heading"aria-labelledby="rebuilding-the-desktop"><svgviewBox="0 0 16 16"aria-hidden="true"><usexlink:href="#svg-link"></use></svg></a> Rebuilding the Desktop </h2><p>Volumes on an old Macintosh system contain an invisible file named “Desktop DB”. This file co
