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I'm having a strange problem this morning

I'm trying to cd into the "Application Support" directory on my Mac, using the following command:

cd '~/Library/Application Support'

Unfortunately, this does not seem to be working as expected and I get this message:

-bash: cd: /Users/purinkle/Library/Application: Not a directory

Even trying cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/ doesn't work

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Try running a shell with default state using bash --noprofile --norc and try running the cd command in that shell. If it works, then something in your shell customization is the problem. – Chris Page Nov 8 '11 at 9:11
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3 Answers

up vote 2 down vote

Both single quotes and double quotes prevent tilde expansion.

Any of these should work though:

  • cd ~/'Library/Application Support/'
  • cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/
  • cd "$HOME/Library/Application Support/"
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I've tried all three and I've even tried cd "/Users/purinkle/Library/Application Support/", but to no avail – purinkle Nov 5 '11 at 13:04
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up vote 1 down vote

You may not put colons around the ~ which otherwise will not be dissolved to home real home directory any more.

Use a backslash to escape the space like you tried or escape only the folder containing the space:

cd ~/Library/'Application Support'/

Your last line works for me. Double-check your spaces, if you still press [alt] while typing space, you will enter some protected space not recognized by bash but displayed similarly. Superuser could have converted this, though (just tested using the preview while posting, it does indeed).

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up vote 0 down vote 
cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/

work fine on my machine .

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