Cannot delete a directory

[Jim Hubbard]

Fool that I am, I left an FTP server (on an XP Pro desktop) open to
anonymous use for about a week, while I was on a customer's site, to make
getting some needed files easier.

All was well until last night. Evidentially someone created a main folder
with a few nested folders inside it last night (undoubtedly to facilitate
file transfers between 2 or more parties of who-knows-what).

When I saw what had been done, I immediately turned off FTP access and
attempted to delete the main directory and its sub-directories. But, when I
tried to delete the main directory I received an error saying that the
directory could not be deleted, and something to the effect that the folder
could not be found.

How is it that I can explore the directory, but XP can't see it to delete
it?

There are no files in any of the sub directories.

I have even tried deleting each folder starting from the bottom folder up.
But that only worked for the first couple of folders. There are 3 left I
can't delete.

The main folder name is "z 62319".

Any ideas?

 

[NunYa]

Delete the child folders first then the root folder and don't be viewing the
folder when ya try to delete. And if that don't work try deleting from
dos...

 

[Jim Hubbard]

I restarted in Safe Mode and did a complete disk check. Took a LONG time,
but no errors were found.

Tried your suggestions but still could not delete the directories.

BUT, if you go into DOS and type "dir /x" to get the short name for the top
directory (in this case it was Z62319~1), you can use that name to delete
the directory from DOS by typing "rd /S Z62319~1" (of course, replace
Z62319~1 with the short file name of your devil folder).

I still don't know what makes XP not able to delete the directory. But DOS
has to use the short name to get rid of it. Before, I was using the long
name in DOS.

Thanks for the pointer!

Jim Hubbard

 

[QuadX]

thanks!

this dos-shortname-approach solved my problem too.

 

[Guest]

I did the same thing as you did with the anonymous FTP (they transferred
about 6 gigs onto my HD... if my low disk space warning didn't pop up, I
might not have clued in).
I cleaned everything but one empty directory... named "com1" in ftproot. XP
tells me that it is currently in use if I try to delete it from the command
prompt...

Any advice?
Kelly