How to Show Invisible Files in Transmit for Mac

Apr 19, 2010 - 9 Comments

show hidden files transmit

If you are trying to view invisible files through the Mac sFTP / FTP client Transmit, stop looking around in the Preferences and View Options because it won’t be there.


Instead, to see hidden files in Transmit, just pull down the ‘View’ menu and scroll down to ‘Show Invisible Files’ to enable this functionality, where invisible files will become seen immediately both when navigating local folders and remote servers.

For managing remote servers, this is particularly useful and it should probably be enabled by default, given the amount of dot prefixed files (.htaccess, .profile, .ssh, etc) that would appear invisible to Transmit, even if you’ve enabled hidden files to be shown on a Mac using defaults command strings.

I love Transmit, it is by far my favorite FTP client for Mac OS X and I’ve used it on a near daily basis for years. This is one thing that’s always bothered me about Transmit though, the ability to view invisible files isn’t part of the File Preferences as you’d expect, instead it’s stuffed somewhat awkwardly in the View menu. This makes sense on a per-view perspective, but I want to always be able to see invisible files which makes it more of a preference in my mind.

Apparently I’m not the only one with this frustration, a friend of mine sent me a really peeved instant message cursing Transmit saying it was crippled and he couldn’t even see the .htaccess files on his webserver, and then he felt stupid after I told him it was just under the “View” menu. And yes, that instant message is the reason for this post, he’s a smart guy and couldn’t find it, surely other people have this problem.

Unfortunately I missed the Transmit official beta signup, otherwise I would attempt to make this a feature request… maybe it will be adopted as a permanent feature with a simple settings switch.

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Posted by: William Pearson in Mac Apps, Tips & Tricks

9 Comments

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  1. Martin says:

    5 years and I still have to open the Main app to see hidden files rather than the dropdown from the menu. How hard can it be?

  2. Sad to say, two and a half years later, this is still a problem. Thanks for revealing the mystery. :-)

  3. Henri says:

    Thank you. I had the same problem! I am managing 2 companies, I am not stupid (I think…) but I really felt stupid as I never though it would be in the View menu ! Fortunately, I know how to use Google and I found your article immediately :-)

  4. LGgeek says:

    What would be really nice is to have invisible files viewable in the favorites config option , so when I click on the key to import I could actually see .ssh

  5. […] Mac OS X Finder. Many applications won’t see the folder either, but various FTP programs like Transmit have the option to show invisible files and the folder would be visible to those applications. Likewise, the folder would always be visible […]

  6. Sugar says:

    Transmit is great but I have to admit I am confused as to why they don’t show invisible files by default like most FTP clients do.

    And FileZilla is terrible in Mac OS X, hardly an alternative to anything.

  7. Alex M says:

    @Chromeo
    FileZilla is OK as a free alternative, but it has nothing over Transmit, which is by far the best FTP program I have ever come across.

    The ability to edit files through Transmit with your preferred editor and then when you save Transmit automatically uploads the file again is a feature I can not live without.

    This ignores the fact that FileZilla doesn’t even have a native Mac OSX interface.

  8. Chromeo says:

    or you could just use a free ftp client like FileZilla and not have to deal with these things

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