zombie files

[Pierre Jelenc]

I have a number of files that refuse to die. They were dragged to the
trash can without any problem, but now the trash can cannot be emptied and
instead I get the message: "Install.exe" cannot be deleted. None of the
files in the trash can are removed.

There is an "install exe" in there, although it is neither first nor last
in the file list. I can select it and rag it to either Black Hole or The
Mangler and repeat for all the undeletable files. They are removed from
the trash can, and the rest of the files can then be deleted.

However, after a reboot they are *all* back! Checkini and Unimaint find no
errors in the INI.

Is there a way to finally get rid of them?

Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc
The Gigometer www.gigometer.com
The NYC Beer Guide www.nycbeer.org

[Peter Brown]

Hi Pierre

Pierre Jelenc wrote:
> I have a number of files that refuse to die. They were dragged to the
> trash can without any problem, but now the trash can cannot be emptied and
> instead I get the message: "Install.exe" cannot be deleted. None of the
> files in the trash can are removed.
>
> There is an "install exe" in there, although it is neither first nor last
> in the file list. I can select it and rag it to either Black Hole or The
> Mangler and repeat for all the undeletable files. They are removed from
> the trash can, and the rest of the files can then be deleted.
>
> However, after a reboot they are *all* back! Checkini and Unimaint find no
> errors in the INI.
>
> Is there a way to finally get rid of them?
>
> Pierre

I don't use the Trashcan myself so wonder if you can open a command line
window in the Trashcan and simply use del *

Regards

Pete

[Pierre Jelenc]

Peter Brown <losepeteS...@ntlworld.com> writes:
>
> I don't use the Trashcan myself so wonder if you can open a command line
> window in the Trashcan and simply use del *

I can open a command line, but there are no files there (neither attrib
nor dir /A show anything) and a blind del * reports no files:
[c:\desktop\trash can]del *
C:\DESKTOP\TRASH CAN\* : Are you sure (Y/N)? Y
There are no more files. "C:\DESKTOP\TRASH CAN\*"
0 files deleted

Yet when I open it as a folder in icon view, the files are there.

[Peter Brown]

Hi Pierre

Pierre Jelenc wrote:
> Peter Brown<losepeteS...@ntlworld.com> writes:
>>
>> I don't use the Trashcan myself so wonder if you can open a command line
>> window in the Trashcan and simply use del *
>
> I can open a command line, but there are no files there (neither attrib
> nor dir /A show anything) and a blind del * reports no files:
> [c:\desktop\trash can]del *
> C:\DESKTOP\TRASH CAN\* : Are you sure (Y/N)? Y
> There are no more files. "C:\DESKTOP\TRASH CAN\*"
> 0 files deleted
>
> Yet when I open it as a folder in icon view, the files are there.
>
> Pierre

Does the Trashcan have an ini file (or any other file) that it stores a
list of files in?

Regards

Pete

[Paul Ratcliffe]

On Fri, 27 Nov 2009 03:20:11 +0000 (UTC), Pierre Jelenc <rc...@panix.com> wrote:

> I have a number of files that refuse to die. They were dragged to the
> trash can without any problem, but now the trash can cannot be emptied and
> instead I get the message: "Install.exe" cannot be deleted. None of the
> files in the trash can are removed.
>
> There is an "install exe" in there, although it is neither first nor last
> in the file list. I can select it and rag it to either Black Hole or The
> Mangler and repeat for all the undeletable files. They are removed from
> the trash can, and the rest of the files can then be deleted.
>
> However, after a reboot they are *all* back! Checkini and Unimaint find no
> errors in the INI.
>
> Is there a way to finally get rid of them?

Open a command line window, navigate to the (hidden) \TRASH directory and
delete everything in there. Then restart the WPS.

[Pierre Jelenc]

Peter Brown <losepeteS...@ntlworld.com> writes:
>
> Does the Trashcan have an ini file (or any other file) that it stores a
> list of files in?

I don't know, it appears to be a pretty ordinary subdirectory of "Desktop"
but it does not contain any files, only "." and ".." at the command line,
while in icon or tree view it contains what are presumably objects that
point to the real files somewhere. These objects do not have a properties
notebook, however.

[Pierre Jelenc]

Paul Ratcliffe <abus...@orac.clara.co.uk> writes:
>
> Open a command line window, navigate to the (hidden) \TRASH directory and
> delete everything in there. Then restart the WPS.

Thanks, there was just one file called @mapping with a list of
directories. I'll see what happens when I reboot.

[James J. Weinkam]

Pierre Jelenc wrote:
> Paul Ratcliffe <abus...@orac.clara.co.uk> writes:
>> Open a command line window, navigate to the (hidden) \TRASH directory and
>> delete everything in there. Then restart the WPS.
>
> Thanks, there was just one file called @mapping with a list of
> directories. I'll see what happens when I reboot.
>

Here is how it works:

Say your boot drive is f and you drag a file, xyz, on drive h to the trash can
object on the desktop.

If it does not already exist, the Trash Can object creates a hidden directory
Trash on drive h, creates a file @mapping in h:\Trash which contains a line of
the form n H:{path}{LF}, where n is an integer, path is the path to xyz, and
{LF} is the Line feed code. It then creates a hidden subdirectory n under
Trash. Finally it moves the file xyz to h:\Trash\n.

At this point, for example the command

copy h:\trash\n\xyz e:\

will copy the "deleted" file to the root of e
.
The command

erase h:\trash\n\*.*

will effectively empty the trash from h:{path}

As you can see, the file @mapping records the mapping between the trash
subdirectories 0,1,... and the paths on h to the directories from which the
deleted files came. This enables the deleted files to be restored to their
original locations.

It is much easier to figure these things out if you use a tool such as Ztree
to analyze the directory tree. It displays hidden files and directories but
greys out their names so they stand out and are easy to spot. You can also do
this from the WPS but you have to go to the include tab of each drive and
directory and edit the display criteria which is a pain.

[James J. Weinkam]

James J. Weinkam wrote:
>
> It is much easier to figure these things out if you use a tool such as
> Ztree to analyze the directory tree. It displays hidden files and
> directories but greys out their names so they stand out and are easy to
> spot. You can also do this from the WPS but you have to go to the
> include tab of each drive and directory and edit the display criteria
> which is a pain.
>

Sorry to reply to my own post. I forgot to add that from the command line you
should use, say, dir h:/trash /a/s to display the entire directory tree below
trash.

[Pierre Jelenc]

James J. Weinkam <j...@cs.sfu.ca> writes:
> >
> Sorry to reply to my own post. I forgot to add that from the command line you
> should use, say, dir h:/trash /a/s to display the entire directory tree below
> trash.

Yes; that, I know: I'm an old DOS (and CP/M) hand. It's that newfangled
GUI stuff that mystifies me...

It looks like it worked, the formerly undead seem to stay dead after one
reboot; I'll keep an eye on the trash can to make sure.

Thanks to all.