Open 'in use' files during large copy operations

Aug 27, '04 10:03:00AM

Contributed by: sveinbjornt

When copying a large file from a network volume mounted in the Finder, the destination file cannot be opened (while the copy is in progress) by double-clicking it in the Finder or via navigation dialogs in Mac OS X applications. Mac OS X will put up a dialog saying "The file is used by Mac OS X and cannot be opened".

This can be very annoying if you're copying a lengthy video or audio file and want to view its contents prior to completion of the copy. The way around this is to use the command line to open the file. It's really quite simple. Open your Terminal application and type the following:

open /path/to/file

Of course, you replace /path/to/file with the path to the file being copied. You might have to use the full path to open, too -- /usr/bin/open, but it should be set up to work without it. Interestingly enough, this will open the file in the default application without objections from OS X.

[robg adds: I'm not a big fan of opening files while they're being modified; it just seems like an invitation to disaster. If you wish to do so, however, this trick should work.]

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