I use XtraFinder to create symbolic links...much smaller than aliases, and when I search for them with EasyFind they appear as "kind" 'slnk' with the exception of one.

That link, to /Applications/Utilities/NoSleepHelper.app is significantly larger than the the app itself - 1.9 MB v 238 KB - and appears as "kind" 'fapa', which apparently is generated by OS X.

The Devon Technologies tech support guy with whom I've been communicating has no idea what 'fapa' means.

Has anybody got an idea?

Thanks.

(I'd like to do some research, but XtraFinder has lost its ability to create symbolic links in /Applications/Utilities...the only location I've found in which it doesn't work, so I'm stuck.)

A "fapa" file is a Finder Application Alias.

When you create an alias in the Finder, it uses a different file type for aliases to applications than aliases to any other kind of file. I believe, though I am not certain, it does this to tell the Finder that double-clicking on the alias should launch the application and not open a folder. (Mac applications are actually folders; inside the folder is the executable code itself, any libraries the application uses, and resources such as sound files or graphics, among other things. A simple alias pointing to an application would actually open the folder.)

A Unix symbolic link to a Mac application would likely do the same thing: simply open the folder. The Unix underpinnings of OS X do not recognize that applications are really folders.

The mystery to me is why this alias (that's what it is; it isn't really a symlink) is so large.

Thanks, tacit.

Your answer makes perfect sense, but isn't it contradicted by the details in screen shots 1 and 2?

Something's clearly wacky!

(The size difference in the 3 actual symbolic links (27 & 28 v -0-) is at the root of my exchange with Devon tech support as is the fact that if I delete the items to which the links point their size as displayed by EasyFind changes from -0- to 27/8; the present question is tangential.)

The screen shots are quite bizarre. I have absolutely no idea why the No Sleep alias/symlink would be so monumentally huge. That's quite odd, no question.

I don't have an answer, but I certainly admire the question!

I appreciate your input!

I'll update this thread if I get any new info from Devon.

The latest from Devon: "I'll investigate this as soon as EasyFind will get some attention again (not in the near future, I'm afraid)."

Yeah, huge aliases are annoying. I remember being severely confused for a short while when replacing photos with aliases to the photos, in an effort to save space on something. The folder got bigger.... The aliases were bigger than the photos!

Open them with a resource editor. Aliases can have icons. And do, by default. And icons keep getting bigger...