Kevin Blanchard Dot Com

One of the recent changes to Apple’s newest OS, OS X Lion, is that the user Library directory is hidden by default. For most users this is fine and serves to protect against a user accidentally changing or deleting a file that could result in applications not working.

But what about the power users? If you are feeling brave you can easily unhide the folder like it was in previous versions.

Please note, before making changes to files used by applications and the system, make sure you have backed up any files you might change.

On a side note: Doing a full back up of your entire system on a regular basis is highly recommended for ALL users regardless if you are tinkering under the hood or just a regular user who doesn’t want to lose years of family photos you have on your machine.

How to:

Making the change is easy for anyone comfortable with the OS X command line.

Open Terminal.app and type the following command:

chflags nohidden ~/Library/

At this point you should be able to see the Library folder in Finder now.

If you want to change it back to being hidden open Terminal.app again and type the following command:

chflags hidden ~/Library

After hiding or unhiding the Library folder it’s possible the change might not show up right away. If that happens you may need to restart Finder.

To restart Finder type the following command:

killall Finder && open /System/Library/CoreServices/Finder.app

And of course, these commands can be used to hide and unhide most folders in OS X not just your user library folder. Just replace ~/Library with the path of the directory  you wish to modify.