Windows 8.1 permissions/files delete?

D

DK

Wife bought a new laptop. I am having distinctly unpleasant time trying
to figure out how to use and administer it. For something that's supposed
to be user-friendly, the learning curve is ridiculously steep.

Anyhow, probably a simple question:

I have an admin account, yet 8.1 still won't let me delete leftover update
files from /windows/software distribution/download/
The permissions for admins for that directory are set to "full" but it
still denies a delete. Even when I change permissions to allow everyone
full control of that directory, the stupid OS still won't alow a delete.

What's up witrh this and how can I fix it?

Thanks,

DK
 
P

Paul

DK said:
Wife bought a new laptop. I am having distinctly unpleasant time trying
to figure out how to use and administer it. For something that's supposed
to be user-friendly, the learning curve is ridiculously steep.

Anyhow, probably a simple question:

I have an admin account, yet 8.1 still won't let me delete leftover update
files from /windows/software distribution/download/
The permissions for admins for that directory are set to "full" but it
still denies a delete. Even when I change permissions to allow everyone
full control of that directory, the stupid OS still won't alow a delete.

What's up witrh this and how can I fix it?

Thanks,

DK

Disk Cleanup has a "Windows Update" section. It's possible
such a setting will clean Software Distribution for you.
(Mine only has around 200MB iin it at the moment, and
I recently tested that option.)

Disk Cleanup will also remove Windows.old, if you've done
an Upgrade install. On Windows 8, Windows.old will also be
automatically deleted 30 days after an upgrade install is
done, so the files would not stay there forever on their
own anyway. I don't consider this to be that clever,
because no user is likely to know about the new policy
(until it is too late).

Disk Clean with "Windows Update" selected, can take as long
as an hour to complete. This is an unfortunate design, where
an interfering task is allowed to run, which prevents
Disk Cleanup from finishing. To speed the process up, you
can pretend to go to Windows Update, and the mere act of
opening the Windows Update window, may cause the Disk Cleanup
to finish relatively quickly.

*******

Takeown and icacls can be used to adjust the properties.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/tims/archiv...vista-secret-11-deleting-the-undeletable.aspx

Those commands have also been packaged as a right-click Context
Menu entry. You can examine the .reg files available for download,
using Notepad, to see how they work and what they do.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/2814-take-ownership-add-context-menu-windows-8-a.html

It's generally not a good idea, to apply such a command to C:
at the top. Modern Windows may not appreciate your
attempts to run it like it was Windows 98. For data disks,
doing that might have fewer side effects (takeown of whole
data-only partition).

Paul
 
M

mmdir2005

Wife bought a new laptop. I am having distinctly unpleasant time trying

to figure out how to use and administer it. For something that's supposed

to be user-friendly, the learning curve is ridiculously steep.



Anyhow, probably a simple question:



I have an admin account, yet 8.1 still won't let me delete leftover update

files from /windows/software distribution/download/

The permissions for admins for that directory are set to "full" but it

still denies a delete. Even when I change permissions to allow everyone

full control of that directory, the stupid OS still won't alow a delete.



What's up witrh this and how can I fix it?



Thanks,



DK


I have similar problem on my secondary backup drive which pulled out from Windows 7 and pulled it back to XP. My XP is no longer free access of all the files and folders in the backup drive. Only option is new formatting and news NTFS ....kill off the sharing and security trace left off from Windows 7.

Look me like Windows 8 is made of more complication than 7 and XP which means more security. I will never try Windows 8.
 
S

s|b

I have an admin account, yet 8.1 still won't let me delete leftover update
files from /windows/software distribution/download/
The permissions for admins for that directory are set to "full" but it
still denies a delete. Even when I change permissions to allow everyone
full control of that directory, the stupid OS still won't alow a delete.

What's up witrh this and how can I fix it?

Try alt.comp.os.windows-8.
 
D

DK

On Sat, 10 May 2014 04:23:28 GMT, (e-mail address removed) (DK) wrote:

| Wife bought a new laptop. I am having distinctly unpleasant time trying
| to figure out how to use and administer it. For something that's supposed
| to be user-friendly, the learning curve is ridiculously steep.
|
| Anyhow, probably a simple question:
|
| I have an admin account, yet 8.1 still won't let me delete leftover update
| files from /windows/software distribution/download/
| The permissions for admins for that directory are set to "full" but it
| still denies a delete. Even when I change permissions to allow everyone
| full control of that directory, the stupid OS still won't alow a delete.
|
| What's up witrh this and how can I fix it?
|
| Thanks,
|
| DK

Check permissions for the name you're actually logged in under. After I
changed that
to Full via the administrator account, I haven't had any problems deleting
files from
that folder and do it regularly. BTW, in my experience the system files clean
function in Disk Cleanup doesn't get rid of those files.

My account right now belongs to administrators group. Permissions for
administrators for that folder were set to full. No delete allowed. I then
went and set permissions to full for everyone. That did not change a
thing - no delete is allowed. I don't understand what it was that you
changed that solved the problem for you.

Thanks,

DK
 
P

Paul

DK said:
My account right now belongs to administrators group. Permissions for
administrators for that folder were set to full. No delete allowed. I then
went and set permissions to full for everyone. That did not change a
thing - no delete is allowed. I don't understand what it was that you
changed that solved the problem for you.

Thanks,

DK

I found an article today on permissions, and it's a whopper.
It may have been written in the Vista era.

"Understanding Windows File And Registry Permissions"

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc982153.aspx

Paul
 
L

lew

I found an article today on permissions, and it's a whopper.
It may have been written in the Vista era.

"Understanding Windows File And Registry Permissions"

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc982153.aspx

Paul

I did a search of the article & wonder what the difference between
"everyone" & "User/computer name/Users". I had "everyone" with
full control but somehow "user/c.. name/Users" only have read/execute;
this occurs for "C:" & "I:" on a different hdd.

I guess that the "User/c.. name/Users" for I: was because I had I:
as shareable at one time for use by a tablet as part of the lan (the
lan plugin for total commander for android". Not sure about this tho.

Still, why the difference in permissions with full control for
"everyone" while the "User/computer name/Users" has limited
permissions? Doesn't make sense as "everyone" would include any
"User/computer name/Users" on the computer.........

A symptom of microsoft logic that they use???
 
L

lew

.............................................


I did a search of the article & wonder what the difference between
"everyone" & "User/computer name/Users". I had "everyone" with
full control but somehow "user/c.. name/Users" only have read/execute;
this occurs for "C:" & "I:" on a different hdd.

I guess that the "User/c.. name/Users" for I: was because I had I:
as shareable at one time for use by a tablet as part of the lan (the
lan plugin for total commander for android". Not sure about this tho.

Still, why the difference in permissions with full control for
"everyone" while the "User/computer name/Users" has limited
permissions? Doesn't make sense as "everyone" would include any
"User/computer name/Users" on the computer.........

A symptom of microsoft logic that they use???

Found a link when searching "authenticated user"; the table applies
to win 2000 & win8.x(?)....

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd277461.aspx
 

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