Undeletable maps

[Guest]

My WinXP Sp1 has two undeletable maps - microsoft frontpage and xerox.
I tried safe boot, de-activate sys file protection - to no avail.
Any suggestions?

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

My WinXP Sp1 has two undeletable maps - microsoft frontpage and xerox.
I tried safe boot, de-activate sys file protection - to no avail.
Any suggestions?

There is no definitive explanation why these folders appear when XP is
installed. The best explanation I have seen is that they are associated with
some kind of obscure license agreement between Microsoft and Xerox for the
Windows Image Aquisition Service.
They are protected by Windows System File Protection and cannot be deleted.
Actually, they can be deleted from outside Windows, but they will be
replaced
when XP is restarted.
The Frontpage folder is associated with IIS.
They are 0 bytes, so they do not take up any space.
It is best to simply ignore them.
They do no harm and are not associated with any virus.
I have seen at least one curious/paranoid person completely trash their
system trying to get rid of them.


--
Ronnie Vernon
Microsoft MVP
Windows Shell/User

Please reply to the newsgroup so all may benefit.
http://www.dts-l.org
http://www.mvps.org

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

This program (ListWFPFiles.exe - new build to sort the list) shows
files are being monitored. WFP works by detecting modifing a file
(unlike SFP which is smarter - it knows what's installed or not).

According to ListWFPFiles one of the two files being monitored is
xrxflcln.exe. I've attached a 26 byte (13 x CRLF) text file with the
name of the monitored file, xrxflcln.exe (this is not a program file
so don't run it - not that it will run). Putting this file in the
directory and in about 20 seconds WFP (if it can access the XP CD)
will have extracted the real xrxflcln.exe and replaced the text file.

To monitor files WFP uses ReadDirectoryChangesW API call that
requires a directory handle to be passed to it, to get a handle one
uses CreateFile (which opens files and creates if doesn't exist) on
the directory.

This is why these empty folders can't be deleted. The folders
themselves are open.

David

Thanks, very interesting.
--
Ronnie Vernon
Microsoft MVP
Windows Shell/User

Please reply to the newsgroup so all may benefit.
http://www.dts-l.org
http://www.mvps.org

 

[Guest]

I'm not sure if I fully grasp David's sophisticated reply but thank you all for yr input.