If you connect your nuvi to a Mac to register it or for syncing, the Mac
creates hidden files on the nuvi that you can't readily see on the Mac
but are apparent if you connect the GPS to a Windows of Linux box.

If you connect to a Mac to edit/remove files not needed from the nuvi,
(e.g., large foreign language or help files), they aren't really removed
from the GPS. Instead they're just moved to hidden folders .Trashes and
..Spotlight-V100 (that's DOT Trashes and DOT Spotlight-V100).

Because you really haven't freed up any space, when you try a map
update, you may get an error message that there isn't enough capacity on
the GPS. But if you hook the GPS back up to a Windows machine and delete
those large folders filled with all the stuff you deleted, you'll have
plenty of room.

One caution-- there's a folder on the GPS called .System (that's DOT
System) -- and that's part of the operating system-- don't mess with it!!

--
Just tell me, mister, what fraternity would pledge a man like you?

Wasn't it told in the marketing of Apple "It just works" ? :-)

On Sat, 12 Nov 2011 09:27:53 -0500, Douglas C. Neidermeyer wrote:

> If you connect to a Mac to edit/remove files not needed from the nuvi,
> (e.g., large foreign language or help files), they aren't really removed
> from the GPS. Instead they're just moved to hidden folders .Trashes and
> .Spotlight-V100 (that's DOT Trashes and DOT Spotlight-V100).

Mac OSX, being unix-based, is behaving "normally" in terms of "hidden"
files. Anything whose name starts with a dot will be excluded from normal
directory listings unless you specify "show hidden/all file" in a gui or
use something like ls -a at a command line.

Likewise, moving files to a "trash" folder is almost certainly a default
function of the GUI. There's probably a setting somewhere where you can
tell it to delete the files in stead of putting them in the trash bin.
Having a separate trash bin for each device or file system is also normal
as "moving" a file to the trash on the same file system simply involves
changing the directory entry. Having a central trash could potentially
means very large files having to moved from one device or filesystem to
another which can take considerable time.



--

On 12/11/11 22:27, Douglas C. Neidermeyer wrote:
> If you connect your nuvi to a Mac to register it or for syncing, the Mac
> creates hidden files on the nuvi that you can't readily see on the Mac
> but are apparent if you connect the GPS to a Windows of Linux box.
>
> If you connect to a Mac to edit/remove files not needed from the nuvi,
> (e.g., large foreign language or help files), they aren't really removed
> from the GPS. Instead they're just moved to hidden folders .Trashes and
> .Spotlight-V100 (that's DOT Trashes and DOT Spotlight-V100).
>
> Because you really haven't freed up any space, when you try a map
> update, you may get an error message that there isn't enough capacity on
> the GPS. But if you hook the GPS back up to a Windows machine and delete
> those large folders filled with all the stuff you deleted, you'll have
> plenty of room.

You can prevent this from happening, by creating a *file* named .Trashes
on the nuvi. Since that name is then taken, MacOSx will not be able to
create that directory/folder and as a result will hard-delete
any file you delete on that disk instead.

Mathias KÅ‘rber wrote on Nov 17, 2011:

> On 12/11/11 22:27, Douglas C. Neidermeyer wrote:
>> If you connect your nuvi to a Mac to register it or for syncing, the Mac
>> creates hidden files on the nuvi that you can't readily see on the Mac
>> but are apparent if you connect the GPS to a Windows of Linux box.
>>
>> If you connect to a Mac to edit/remove files not needed from the nuvi,
>> (e.g., large foreign language or help files), they aren't really removed
>> from the GPS. Instead they're just moved to hidden folders .Trashes and
>> .Spotlight-V100 (that's DOT Trashes and DOT Spotlight-V100).
>>
>> Because you really haven't freed up any space, when you try a map
>> update, you may get an error message that there isn't enough capacity on
>> the GPS. But if you hook the GPS back up to a Windows machine and delete
>> those large folders filled with all the stuff you deleted, you'll have
>> plenty of room.
>
> You can prevent this from happening, by creating a *file* named .Trashes
> on the nuvi. Since that name is then taken, MacOSx will not be able to
> create that directory/folder and as a result will hard-delete
> any file you delete on that disk instead.

..Trashes is not the only hidden file/folder that OS X leaves on any drive
that it opens - there are several others, all with filenames beginning 'dot'.
The Unix convention is to ignore these unless they're actually used by the
system.

Unfortunately the folk at Garmin never seem to have taken this fully on
board, and the hidden files can cause problems - particularly on some older
units. I have a Garmin GPSMap 76Cx that will crash if you insert an SD card
which has previously been opened on a Mac.

My solution to this is to use a small App called BlueHarvest (not free
unfortunately) which works in the background and transparently removes all
hidden Mac files from any non-Mac drive opened by the system.

--
Mike Lane
UK North Yorkshire
mike_lane at mac dot com