ln -s (softlink) weirdness?

[solomanii]

Hi all,

New user here for both the hardware and O/S. Just a *nix related question.

I grabbed the WallpaperHD app from the app store but I didnt like where it stored wallpapers so created a softlink. Here are the commands and they are pretty basic unix commands:

16 cd /Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Libr ary/
18 cd Application\ Support/
21 rm -rf WallpapersHD/
22 ln -s /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper WallpapersHD

In Unix this should work fine. However the app says it downloads it but it doesnt appear in the folder. In fact I am not sure where its putting the file as find shows nothing. Is there something different on Lion to standard unix with the softlink command? It should just work indepedent of the application. Application should see no difference.

Before I contact the app owner wanted to check with O/S experts to make sure it wasnt something unique to Lion.

Thanks.

 

[justperry]

I think you are doing it the wrong way around.

I just downloaded WallpapersHDLite, it creates that folder in the same Directory as yours except it is named "WallpapersHDLite"
So, here's what I did, I moved that Folder over to ~/Home/Library/WallPapers and then created a SymLink (NOT SoftLink) in the place it is originally in.

In Terminal it should be this:

1. mv /Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdlite/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallpapersHDLite /Users/solomani/Library/WallPapers
2. Hit Enter
3ln -s /Users/solomani/Library/WallPapers/WallpapersHDLite /Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdlite/Data/Library/Application\ Support
4. Hit Enter

It works on mine, I changed the above to your User name.

 

[solomanii]

Hi, thanks for the reply. Thats not what I quite want. I have a pre-existing folder called wallpaper in my pictures directory. The path to this directory is:

/Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper

I want the app to download pictures to this directory. By default it dumps wallpapers into:

/Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/WallPapersHD

I want it to dump them into /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper so I thought a softlink should do it?

Hippolyta:Application Support solomani$ ls -al
total 48
drwx------ 8 solomani staff 272 Apr 7 18:40 .
drwx------ 28 solomani staff 952 Apr 6 17:00 ..
lrwxr-xr-x 1 solomani staff 34 Apr 7 18:40 WallPapersHD -> /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper
drwxr-xr-x 5 solomani staff 170 Apr 7 18:37 WallPapersHD.20130407

 

[Weaselboy]

Hi, thanks for the reply. Thats not what I quite want. I have a pre-existing folder called wallpaper in my pictures directory. The path to this directory is:

/Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper

I want the app to download pictures to this directory. By default it dumps wallpapers into:

/Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/WallPapersHD

I want it to dump them into /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper so I thought a softlink should do it?[/B]

First, delete the Wallpaper folder you made in Pictures, since we will create that folder when making the symlink.

Now enter the command below in Terminal. That should do what you want.

ln -s ~/Pictures/Wallpaper ~/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallPapersHD

 

[solomanii]

hmm didn't work, maybe the app? I checked permissions they look OK as well.

ln -s ~/Pictures/Wallpaper ~/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallPapersHD

Hippolyta:Application Support solomani$ ls -al
total 56
drwx------   9 solomani  staff   306 Apr  7 22:47 .
drwx------  28 solomani  staff   952 Apr  6 17:00 ..
-rw-r--r--@  1 solomani  staff  6148 Apr  7 17:36 .DS_Store
lrwxr-xr-x   1 solomani  staff    46 Apr  6 12:52 AddressBook -> ../../../../../Application Support/AddressBook
lrwxr-xr-x   1 solomani  staff    47 Apr  6 12:52 SyncServices -> ../../../../../Application Support/SyncServices
lrwxr-xr-x   1 solomani  staff    34 Apr  7 22:47 WallPapersHD -> /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper
drwxr-xr-x   2 solomani  staff    68 Apr  7 22:45 WallPapersHD.20130407
lrwxr-xr-x   1 solomani  staff    41 Apr  6 12:52 iCloud -> ../../../../../Application Support/iCloud
-rw-r--r--   1 solomani  staff     4 Apr  7 19:07 tr

Hippolyta:Application Support solomani$ cd WallPapersHD
Hippolyta:WallPapersHD solomani$ pwd
/Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/WallPapersHD
Hippolyta:WallPapersHD solomani$ ls -al
total 1530688
drwx---rwx  623 solomani  staff     21182 Apr  7 18:46 .
drwx------+  17 solomani  staff       578 Apr  7 22:46 ..
-rw-r--r--@   1 solomani  staff     67588 Apr  7 22:38 .DS_Store
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    748509 Mar 26  2010 01-spitzer-omeganebula.jpg
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    702508 Mar 26  2010 02-spitzer-lmc.jpg
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    789197 Mar 26  2010 03-spitzer-w5nebula.jpg
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    528731 Mar 26  2010 04-spitzer-helixnebula.jpg
-rwx------@   1 solomani  staff    657422 Mar 24 20:52 05-borderlands-2-mechromancer-dlc-2.jpg
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    349013 Mar 26  2010 05-spitzer-pleiades.jpg
-rwx------    1 solomani  staff    350744 Apr 26  2008 050108_WAR_FelixGotrek_16x9.jpg

etc

 

[Weaselboy]

hmm didn't work, maybe the app? I checked permissions they look OK as well.

Did it make the link? In Finder if you go to ~/Pictures and double click Wallpaper does that jump you to the App Support sub folder mentioned?

Those "Containers" folders are part of OS X sandboxing, and I am wondering if permissions is blocking you from monkeying around in there? Maybe try the same command I suggested with sudo up front?

 

[solomanii]

Yep it made the soft link and it should work, must be some odd perm issue. I am not familiar enougth with OSX to say what it is exactly. However if I reverse the softlink it works fine. So this is an acceptable work around:

ln -s ~/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallPapersHD ~/Pictures/Wallpaper

Thanks both for your advice. Very helpful.

 

[justperry]

Hi, thanks for the reply. Thats not what I quite want. I have a pre-existing folder called wallpaper in my pictures directory. The path to this directory is:

/Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper

I want the app to download pictures to this directory. By default it dumps wallpapers into:

/Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/WallPapersHD

I want it to dump them into /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper so I thought a softlink should do it?

Hippolyta:Application Support solomani$ ls -al
total 48
drwx------ 8 solomani staff 272 Apr 7 18:40 .
drwx------ 28 solomani staff 952 Apr 6 17:00 ..
lrwxr-xr-x 1 solomani staff 34 Apr 7 18:40 WallPapersHD -> /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper
drwxr-xr-x 5 solomani staff 170 Apr 7 18:37 WallPapersHD.20130407

It didn't work because in my link it says wallpapershdLite instead of wallpapershdfull

So:

Sudo mv /Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/WallPapersHD /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper
Enter
Enter Password
sudo ln -s /Users/solomani/Pictures/Wallpaper/WallPapersHD /Users/solomani/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application Support/
Enter

----------

Yep it made the soft link and it should work, must be some odd perm issue. I am not familiar enougth with OSX to say what it is exactly. However if I reverse the softlink it works fine. So this is an acceptable work around:

ln -s ~/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallPapersHD ~/Pictures/Wallpaper

Thanks both for your advice. Very helpful.

Ah, you solved it.

Edit: It's called a symlink

 

[Weaselboy]

Yep it made the soft link and it should work, must be some odd perm issue. I am not familiar enougth with OSX to say what it is exactly. However if I reverse the softlink it works fine. So this is an acceptable work around:

ln -s ~/Library/Containers/com.stuckpixelinc.wallpapershdfull/Data/Library/Application\ Support/WallPapersHD ~/Pictures/Wallpaper

Thanks both for your advice. Very helpful.

Doh! As I sit and look at this I see I gave you the paths backwards the first time. Glad you figured out my error.

 

[solomanii]

No problem. But it should work both ways, correct? So root issue does seem perms of some kind. Kind of surprised the app didn't spit out an error which may have been helpful for troubleshooting.

 

[Weaselboy]

No problem. But it should work both ways, correct? So root issue does seem perms of some kind. Kind of surprised the app didn't spit out an error which may have been helpful for troubleshooting.

No, it won't work both ways. What you did was tell it anything I send to folder one (Containers...), really put in folder two (Pictures...).