Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!rutgers!sri-unix!larson
From: larson@unix.SRI.COM (Alan Larson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: virus (sort of) problem
Keywords: desktop, virus, apple
Message-ID: <24374@sri-unix.SRI.COM>
Date: 16 Nov 88 10:04:30 GMT
Organization: SRI International, Menlo Park, CA
Lines: 23


Recently I used the Virus Rx program from Apple to check the condition
of my hard disk.  (All was fine, fortunately.)  Later, I happened to
notice that some programs which had the generic application icon had
changed to showing the icon for Virus Rx.

It appears that Virus Rx had a creator of '    ' (4 blanks), which is
the default if not filled in by several compilers.  It also included
an icon attached to that creator, which got propigated to the desktop
and used for other programs with the same creator field.

The interesting part is that it does not seem necessary to actually
run the Virus Rx program to do this!  We have a 'virus' (the bogus
icon) that spreads if you just put the file on the disk.


How do I get rid of this?  I have thrown away the Virus Rx program
from the hard disk, but the icon is still there.

I do not want to rebuild the desktop, as many of my files have comments
with them, and I do not want to lose those.

	Alan