Vista's Junctions

[Robert Morley]

Okay, so I'm finally getting around to really exploring Vista for the first
time, and I found a bunch of hidden junction folders that, at first glance,
appeared not to be working. Of course, I later realized that there was a
Deny permission issue going on, and after Googling it, I discovered that
that was by design. "Why deny folder browsing only?" I won't ask, but fine,
it's by design.

I suspect that early on, I might have deleted one or two of these apparently
non-functioning junctions. Is there a way to get Vista to re-create the
default junctions? Or do I even need to...will it do so automatically when
an older app tries to use them?


Thanks,
Rob

 

[Tyro]

Junctions are used by Vista to re-direct references to folders in older
windows versions of windows such as Windows XP's "Documents and Settings" to
the appropriate folder in vista. You may see junctions from a command window
with "dir %userprofile% /ad Junctions, like many other things that belong
to Vista, are best left alone. A junction is a shortcut. However, according
to the documentation I have, deleting a shortcut just deletes the pointer,
not the pointee but deleting a junction also deletes the pointee! I have
never played with this and I'm not about to find out about it the hard way.

Tyro

 

[CBoom]

do a system restore..

to a time before you deleted those...

many xp era programs will need them to install

 

[Poutnik]

Junctions are used by Vista to re-direct references to folders in older
windows versions of windows such as Windows XP's "Documents and Settings" to
the appropriate folder in vista. You may see junctions from a command window
with "dir %userprofile% /ad Junctions, like many other things that belong
to Vista, are best left alone. A junction is a shortcut. However, according
to the documentation I have, deleting a shortcut just deletes the pointer,
not the pointee but deleting a junction also deletes the pointee! I have
never played with this and I'm not about to find out about it the hard way.

on vista one need to distinguish

for folders
between explorer shortcuts ( *.lnk )
junctions ( see mklink /J )
and folder symlinks ( see mklink /D )

for files
between explorer shortcuts ( *.lnk )
symlinks ( softlinks) see mklink )
and hardlinks ( see mklink /H )

 

[Tyro]

?

Tyro

on vista one need to distinguish

for folders
between explorer shortcuts ( *.lnk )
junctions ( see mklink /J )
and folder symlinks ( see mklink /D )

for files
between explorer shortcuts ( *.lnk )
symlinks ( softlinks) see mklink )
and hardlinks ( see mklink /H )

 

[Poutnik]

?

Tyro

If you question has more details,
I would be able to answer.

 

[Robert Morley]

Thanks, Tyro, I knew what they were and how they worked, I just figured the
junctions I saw were "broken" until I really paid attention to the fact that
it was a security message I was seeing, not a "not found" message.

It's a moot point now in any event, cuz it never occurred to me to check my
scanner for Vista compatibility, so shortly after installing Vista, I ended
up ripping it out to install a dual boot of XP/Vista, thus re-instating any
junctions I may have deleted.

This time, I won't make the same mistake...though I may go around and remove
those silly "Deny" permission attributes...they're just annoying!



Rob

 

[Robert Morley]

That might've worked, had I not temporarily turned off System Restore.
<blush> It made sense to me at the time!

As I said in my other message, though, it's a moot point now, so no worries.
Thanks for the idea, though.


Rob

 

[NetLink_Blue]

You mention in another message that you are dual-booting now. WinXP &
Vista.

You might already know about a System Restore quirk when setup to dual-boot.
Your System Restore points will constantly be erased, as you boot between XP
and Vista. Now that I have XP upgraded to -SP_3 service pack, my restore
points "hold" under that OS. Vista's System Restore points still get wiped
out if I boot into XP, then back into Vista.

Thought you should know.

NetLink

 

[Robert Morley]

Thanks for the info, I was unaware of that issue.


Rob