Thread: UNIX File problem

I have a file in a directory on my UNIX account and I am trying to remove it. When I list the directory it is there, when I view the directory from WS_FTP it is there, but when I try to remove it then it tells me the file is not there. I get the standard "no such file or directory" on both the command line and WS_FTP.

I figure maybe the permissions had been changed(somehow) and that's why I can't delete it, so I try to change the mode of the file and I get .. chmod: WARNING: can't access Filename.

So then I decide to look in the manual, I type in man and accidently hit enter before I typed in what I wanted to look up and it says no manual entry for FileName where filename is the name of the file I want to delete. Now this is getting weird!!

Anybody know what's going on here?

Sun Solaris, System 5 Release 8

I'm guessing you've got a filename with some non-printing characters in the filename

Try something like (check man page for options)
ls -b
Should print all non-printable chars in \nnn octal format

If you want to get rid of the file, try this
1. make sure
ls foo*
lists only the filename in question. Find a pattern which matches only that filename

2. use this to get rid of it
rm -fi foo*
replacing foo* with the pattern which uniquely matches the file without having to type any funny chars.

I tried listing non printable characters with -b and - q and it didn't display any, but rm -fi Foo* worked beautifully so thank you very much.