What could be causing a file from 2011 to be undeletable?

[JaredJames]

I agree, the Linux method is guaranteed to fix it, and you don't have to wipe your drive. I think on the boot screen it will say "try out linux" or something to that effect and you can run it without installing it on your hard disk.

Correct.

 

[hamster143]

I agree, the Linux method is guaranteed to fix it, and you don't have to wipe your drive. I think on the boot screen it will say "try out linux" or something to that effect and you can run it without installing it on your hard disk.

The Linux method may work as far as it will remove the file, but you're just asking for more problems down the road. The underlying issue is, evidently, the filesystem corruption, and that's what you have to fix in order to delete the file properly. Going in with a third-party filesystem driver and forcibly removing it will only increase the corruption.

 

[JaredJames]

The Linux method may work as far as it will remove the file, but you're just asking for more problems down the road. The underlying issue is, evidently, the filesystem corruption, and that's what you have to fix in order to delete the file properly. Going in with a third-party filesystem driver and forcibly removing it will only increase the corruption.

I'm not denying it could be down to a larger problem, but it's only one file.

One error is not a sign of file system corruption. It's a glitch in the registry at best.

I've had windows 'forget' about files a number of times, it's not a sign of a major issue and only required the Linux method to solve - I checked the registry with a number of systems for any problems and none were found. Frankly, given the number of files being dealt with it's really not surprising that the OS has a glitch like this every now and then.

It doesn't matter what software you use to wipe out the file. Otherwise that would mean plugging my external hard drive initially used with windows into my linux machine is dangerous and risks severe corruption.

Technically, you're not forcibly removing the file. You're doing a normal delete operation. The only risk involved is ensuring you're not removing a required windows file.

 

[mathman]

I don't have a linux CD. Is there a source online?

 

[hamster143]

I'm not denying it could be down to a larger problem, but it's only one file.

One error is not a sign of file system corruption. It's a glitch in the registry at best.

I've had windows 'forget' about files a number of times, it's not a sign of a major issue and only required the Linux method to solve - I checked the registry with a number of systems for any problems and none were found. Frankly, given the number of files being dealt with it's really not surprising that the OS has a glitch like this every now and then.

It doesn't matter what software you use to wipe out the file. Otherwise that would mean plugging my external hard drive initially used with windows into my linux machine is dangerous and risks severe corruption.

Technically, you're not forcibly removing the file. You're doing a normal delete operation. The only risk involved is ensuring you're not removing a required windows file.

Registry has absolutely nothing to do with it. If the file is not in use, but you still can't delete it or even access its properties, something must be wrong with the file system.

It does not matter what software you use, as long as the file system is OK. If you expect to see two different outcomes from the delete operation in Windows and in Linux, then evidently the file system is not OK, but maybe the Linux driver handles abnormal situations in a different way from the Windows driver.

Here's a simple analogy. You want to get a book off the book shelf. In the normal circumstances, books stand next to each other and can be pulled individually, and anyone can take any book without any problems.

You send your servant to that book shelf and he comes back and says "I can't get it easily, other books are in the way". Your solution is to find a more obedient servant. He'll bring you the book, but possibly at the expense of creating a big pile of books on the floor (maybe books were stacked vertically for some reason, and the book you wanted was at the bottom of the stack.) The correct solution is to send a servant to put the books in order.

 

[hamster143]

I don't have a linux CD. Is there a source online?

You can download a bootable USB drive with Linux on it from ubuntu.org.

 

[caffenta]

Registry has absolutely nothing to do with it. If the file is not in use, but you still can't delete it or even access its properties, something must be wrong with the file system.

"If the file is not in use" is a big if. There is no way of easily telling if it is indeed in use, except for the fact that you cannot delete/move it. Not being able to see file properties is not necessarily a file system corruption. The program that has a lock on the file can deny any access to it, including property queries.

I agree with the rest of your post. If there is indeed a file system corruption, trying to forcibly delete it with Linux is only asking for trouble. A better way is to let Windows do a filesystem scan during the boot sequence.

But it really all comes down to this: is the file actually a problem? Or is it just some irrational need to delete it. If it's not a problem, forget about the file.

 

[hamster143]

There is no way of easily telling if it is indeed in use, except for the fact that you cannot delete/move it. Not being able to see file properties is not necessarily a file system corruption.

The OP stated that the file is located in the temp folder and that he was unable to delete it in safe mode. That's a strong indication that the file is not in use.

 

[caffenta]

The OP stated that the file is located in the temp folder and that he was unable to delete it in safe mode. That's a strong indication that the file is not in use.

Not necessarily. I have a zero-length file in my temp folder that can't be deleted (it's a debug log). I'm using Win7, but XP is not that different. If I boot in safe mode and log on as myself, I still can't delete it. If I log on as another user with administrator privileges, I can delete the file. But guess what? The file is right back when I reboot and log on under my normal account because the program recreated it.

I'm not sure the OP has tried the "log on as an another administrator" method that rcgldr suggested:

in that case, logging on as another administrator user should allow you to delete any files related to "herb" .

when i tried the safe mode, i said i was the administrator, but it didn't do any good.

Being an administrator doesn't mean that he was logged on as another administrator.

 

[JaredJames]

You send your servant to that book shelf and he comes back and says "I can't get it easily, other books are in the way".

As has been pointed out before, the file can appear to be in use when it isn't. So you can't do anything with it.

I've had it a number of times where a program has an error (whether internal or simply crashes - even no error appearing to exist) and it has maintained file locks even though the file is no longer in use.

There was a common error I kept having with media player where the player would be closed but the files were untouchable - the error was it was showing as media player still using them, even after checking it wasn't running anywhere.

Given it's the temp folder and it's been checked it isn't running, this to me would be the most likely cause.

As I said before, given its location (with the nature of this folders use) it doesn't seem to be a likely file system corruption. Again, anywhere else and I'd be questioning it or with a number of instances within the temp folder.

When you diagnose the fault you have to take these factors into account.

Here is a site outlining everything we've discussed here, but they've also mentioned using the prompt: http://winhlp.com/node/39

 

[mathman]

Update on bad file. The name of the file seems to be far too long (over 150 characters) to be handled. Furthermore the "type" has about 40 characters. I suspect these factors are the cause of the problem, and the file itself is probably not corrupted.

 

[mathman]

I raised the same question on another forum and after many back and forths someone was able to supply a very simple solution that worked! The obstacle to deleting the file was that its name L.asp* has far too many characters.

The essence was to use the concept of a virtual folder as follows. Here I am displaying the original recipe and my changes.

subst P: "c:\Documents and Settings\Herb\Local Settings\Temp"
P:
attrib -r -a -s -h P:\filestart*.ext (my note - I did not need this step)
del filestart*.ext (my note - del L.asp*)
C:
subst P: /d

 

[zalathel]

Try with LongPathTool. I should help in your case, it helped me in a similar problem :)