I'd like to restrict the size a specific folder/directory using Windows
XP. The drive is formatted with NTFS.
Please tell me how to set a size capacity on a specific folder.
Note: This is a stand-alone computer (not on a network). However, it
does have internet access.
Thanks,
-Steve
Are you trying to restrict it for one or more specific users, or for
everyone?
Disk quotas allow for per-user restrictions, but are per volume (drive
letter), not per folder. Thus, you can limit any or all users, but only
to the space used on the entire drive, not a single folder.
If you want to restrict the folder size for all users, one possibility is
to create a new partition the size you want the limit to be (perhaps even
on another disk drive), then assign that partition to the folder in
question instead of to a drive letter. You need to first have the folder
created, but empty, then you can do this assignment in Disk Management.
This limit would apply to all users, and could not later be increased
without recreating the partition at a different size. The data is
actually stored in the partition, but appears in the folder that the
partition is mapped overtop of.
This assignment creates what is called a Junction, if you want to look
that up. If this all sounds too complicated, you should probably leave
it alone.
There is a tool called Junction available at
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/Junction.mspx
which allows you to create Junctions. This would allow you to have a
folder on one disk, then map it overtop of an empty folder on another
disk. The data appears in both folders, but is actually only stored in
the first one. The size limit of the folder would be the size of the
disk where the data actually is. I've not tried combining this with disk
quotas on the disk where the data is stored, but that might allow for
controlling individual user's space limits (would also affect other
folders on that drive).
