John259 Posted April 18, 2004 Share Posted April 18, 2004 I've got Windows XP Home Edition SP1, with all critical and security patches installed (fully up to date).All folders now have the read-only attribute shown as a green square in the Properties dialog box. All attempts at clearing this fail. When the folder's properties are examined again, the green square always reappears.I tried attrib - r *.* /s /d in cmd - it doesn't fix it.I tried the advice in MS KB article 326549 - it doesn't fix it.I tried the registry tweak advised on several web sites, namely to add a new DWORD called UseSystemForSystemFolders with a value of 1 in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Explorer (and reboot) - it doesn't fix it.I think the possible causes might be installing .NET Framework V1.1, or one of this week's Windows critical updates (one of those published in the week ending 17-Apr-04).The only visible effect (so far!) is that it seems to stop a downloaded Java applet from working. The applet fails to gain I/O permission to (of all things!) a GIF file.Does anyone know the solution?John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John259 Posted April 20, 2004 Author Share Posted April 20, 2004 I did some more research.It seems as if this behaviour is normal for Windows XP. One might almost risk saying that it is "by design" :)Can anyone confirm whether it happens on their computer as well? And if not, some details of their system to help track down why?John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest LilBambi Posted April 20, 2004 Share Posted April 20, 2004 Are you a normal user or admin?You might try Fred Langa's CleanXP or any other Temporary Internet File (TIF) cleaner to get rid of the TIF files.Fred Langa: Scrub your hard drive clean Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed_P Posted April 20, 2004 Share Posted April 20, 2004 Can anyone confirm whether it happens on their computer as well?Yup. All my c: drive folders are classified as Read Only. It doesn't stop me from changing any of the files within them so I don't see it as a problem. It could be they are classified as such simply because they have files within them.And I run Java on both Netscape and IE so I don't think its your problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exsubdriversdod Posted February 7, 2005 Share Posted February 7, 2005 I have a related problem to John259. Since the last time I booted, I am unable to access any of the files in any directory/sub-directory on my D drive. I get two messages that say:1. Cannot access read-only document X2. Cannot access document XThe read-only file attribute for these files is not checked. The attrib solution and the KB solution does not clear up the problem. I even gave my account ADMIN privileges and still no solution. When I look at the "security" tab under "properties" it says that my account has full control.On the chance that some external peecee snuck something onto my peecee I ran full scans by MS Antispyware, AVG, Ad-Aware, and Spybot with no "positives". I am also running ZA Pro. So, at least for the moment, I am discounting any external interference.I created a new file, and can access it so I am only dealing with the existing ones..../rgds/exsubdriversdod Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed_P Posted February 8, 2005 Share Posted February 8, 2005 I've seen that kinda situation where the client opens the same document multiple times and forgets which one was opened 1st for updating. But your situation is broader. Do you have any apps trying to run a backup of the folder/s that are unaccessible? Are your folders on a network and does someone else have them opened for update? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exsubdriversdod Posted February 8, 2005 Share Posted February 8, 2005 Mr. Ed,I have a stand-alone peecee. The problem has all the symptoms of ownership contention. The messages mentioned in first post are for .xls files. The message that is generated for .doc files is "the document name or path is not valid. *Check the file permissions for the file or drive...."One other anomaly I have detected is that access is only denied for files that are encrypted. I turned the encryption function off at the folder level; but it does not remove the encryption function for the files within the folder. When I try to uncheck the encryption option for a file, I get "access denied".In all cases, the folders and files show that my account has full control of them..../exsubdriversdod Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed_P Posted February 9, 2005 Share Posted February 9, 2005 The message that is generated for .doc files is "the document name or path is not valid.Are you trying to access the files via Word's File menu or a Windows Explorer window? The former's list is not as accurate as the latter's. For example I create document a, update it and save it as b, update it further and save it as c. I then use WIndows Explorer to delete documents a and b since they are not the final copy. Word's File MRU menu will still show document's a and b, even though they no longer exist. And clicking on their names in that menu will give the results you describe. I have never used encryption on files myself so I'll defer to others to respond to that aspect. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
exsubdriversdod Posted February 9, 2005 Share Posted February 9, 2005 Are you trying to access the files via Word's File menu or a Windows Explorer window? Accessing the file via Word (or Excel) or Explore yields the same results.Being an old-time debugger, I reviewed what had changed since the last good access to the files. The significant change is that I was doing my usual periodic password change and did it while in my Admin account.So, I decided that maybe the problem is that the encrypted files are expecting "User Account - Old Password". Sadly, changing the password back to the old one is not the silver bullet. So unless anyone has other thoughts, I will have to go to my offline backup files and restore them. The good news is that few have changed since I last backed them up. The not so good news (Murphy at his best) is that the ones that I most actively access are the very ones that I need right now...../exsubdriversdod Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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