My 'USB flash' does not have write permission. I can't copy files into it via Nautilus?

Question

I have a USB cooldisk 8.0 GB. it was full of Windows viruses. I tried to delete them under Ubuntu 13.04, but it didn't allow me to delete anything!

I formatted it using 'Disks' to FAT filesystem and overwrite all data by zero. Again, I can't delete anything! I can't change permission of any file!

But, I can do anything by Terminal (CLI). I can create folder by mkdir. I can copy files by cp. etc. I ran sudo chmod 777 -R /media/me/USB/*, but the permission did not change:

I want do all this in Nautilus. It does not allow me to create folder, copy, change permissions in Nautilus (Files).

What's the problem?

Solution 1

It is not necessary to format the flash drive or to nuke the partition. You can go to mount and then change the ownership of your flashdrive. On ubuntu :

cd /media
sudo chown -R username drivename

Of course replace username by your username and drivename by the name of your flash drive.

Then you will be able to use nautilus as usual to copy/move/delete your files.

Solution 2

Try formatting it into ext4 format, then again format it in FAT. And you can also try the command , sudo rm /media/me/USB/* . Be sure to copy your files before formatting.

Solution 3

With my pen drive: formatting, changing partition type didn't helped.

/media/user was empty, although nautilus was showing USB as mounted.

It helped simple:

Run disks, click settings of that drive, mounting, disable automounting, identify as: I chosed simply /dev/sdb1 click OK, unmount and mout again.

Solution 4

I had the same problem. I don't know how it happened, I also used the gnome disk management app, and somehow my directory in /media had the wrong ownership:

drwxr-x--- 1 root  root  0 Sep 28  2012 me

I deleted it (after unmounting all media), plugged in a usb drive and the directory has been recreated correctly:

drwx------ 1 me    root 18 Mai  1 01:59 me

Now everything's fine again.

Solution 5

go to "users and group". Change the account type from "desktop user" or "custom" to "administrator". This will give you the permissions if you are using a personal computer

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Comments

[Manuel]

Please post the output of mount after you plugged in an mounted the USB stick.

[Trevor Clarke]

do you mean "I can't do anything...." at the beginning of the third paragraph?

[mini]

As I said, I've formatted it once! I also ran gksudo nautilus /media/me/USB => failed to copy/paste/delete/etc.

[SimplySimon]

Try formatting to one of the Linux formats

[mini]

It should be FAT! I use it in my car for listening to music. the player of car just supports FAT systemfile!

[SimplySimon]

You should be able to change permissions by mounting it with root nautilus (su then after password, nautilus) and transferring permissions to 'guest'.

[Richard]

Well yeah after that he will be able to use nautilus as usual. Edited, thanks

[David Foerster]

/dev/sdb doesn't seem right because usually only partitions contain file systems that may be mounted and not bare storage drives. Did you mean /dev/sdb1, the first partition on /dev/sdb, perhaps?

[glen abdelnoor]

Hi David, I probably should have mentioned that at this point I had removed the partition completely and had an unmounted bare storage drive. The reason being that whenever I formatted the drive before sdb1 was only writable as root. When I removed the partition and formated using any of the graphical tools I had the same problem. When I did it the way I described above it finally worked. I can honestly say I don't know why it did.

[NeverEndingQueue]

If only my parents knew that, they wouldn't be using Windows :)