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Access denied on long path

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9 replies

by krudy

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Somehow a folder was created on a server that is 49 sub folders deep. I can't delete it because of the one pesky file at the lowest level. The file has no properties that NT can display. Delete commands don't seem to work on it. I get: "The source file maybe in use" when trying to delete a folder above it. From a command prompt consecutive CD commands eventually leads to: "Current drive no longer valid" or "Invalid directory". If I path it out and run the del command in a batch file I get: "Thesystem cannot find the specified path". I've done this before and after rebooting the server. 44 of the sub folders in the middle of the path all have the same name. I can't find any user who did this on purpose. Any ideas on how to correct this anomaly?

9 replies

by syscokid

Don't know if this will help or not, but I've found that drag-and-drop to the recycle bin will work when all other methods fail.

by krudy

Thanks for the response, but Drag n Drop didn't help. Any delete method through the GUI has no noticeable result.

by tuqan

The only way I know to do this is to delete the file outside the GUI (DOS). This must be done prior to not after system bootup. As long as the system is up you will not be able to delete this file. Boot to DOS and remove the file from there. In fact I'd DELTREE the Path to the file if removing it all will not do the system nor your user any harm.

by liaor

If you are running NTFS, you may not be able access your drives, for DOS can only read FAT file systems. You can, however, access the NTFS partition with a little utility I heard from my friends...

NTFSDOS
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntfs30.htm
It is supposed to let you access your NTFS partitions. From there, you can just Deltree the folder or you can go all the way into the file, delete it, and "rm" it all the way back to root.

Hope this helps.
Good luck

by krudy

Thanks for the response. This probably would have worked. However I tried Answer 4 first. That worked very well

by krudy

Thanks! This worked well. I'm a little embarassed that I didn't think of it.

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