A way of recovering from "The path is too long"

[John Gray]

I'd taken a copy of my Windows 7 C: drive onto another disk, but somehow after three or four levels the Application Data directory had repeated itself an enormous number of times (with files at some levels) and was entirely undeletable by all the methods known to me, viz:

• Windows Explorer delete
• RD <toplevel> /q /s
• RD \\?\E:\<toplevel> /q /s
• Unlocker
• Safe Mode with all the above

Fortunately I came across a sneaky Robocopy method:
Create an empty directory E:\MT (ho-ho!), and Mirror it to the undeletable directory structure, using something like

Code: Select all

ROBOCOPY E:\MT E:\<toplevel> /MIR /E /R:0 /W:0 > E:\$log.txt

It did an awful lot of work but the job was done in a few minutes, leaving the now heavily-truncated undeletable directory structure to be trivially deleted!

[HansV]

Thanks for the tip!

[BobArch2]

I'd taken a copy of my Windows 7 C: drive onto another disk...

Thanks for the tip John. Now, where were you several months ago when I had a similar problem? My solution was to format the da.. hard drive. That showed them!

[John Gray]

You won't know how close I was to doing that! And I'd also done a full CHKDSK!

[ChrisGreaves]

Application Data directory had repeated itself an enormous number of times

John, where were you when I needed you two days ago? (mutter mutter!)
I had this problem with my Win7 installation and assumed it was something I'd done as a newbie to Win7.
The manifestation was a RoboCopy backup that filled my external drive after running for about 6 hours!
My novice solution was to rebuild the hard disk from the recovery partition, reinstall Win7, Mozilla, Office et al.

To learn that RoboCopy is a solution to the problem manifest (but not caused) by RoboCopy makes this my Aaaargh! moment of the day (grin!)

[John Gray]

There is a good series of posts from Microsoft Social Answers which explains that this problem with repeated instances of "Application Data" is probably as a result of changing permissions without realising the drastic effect that this can have.

For Robocopy use, the magic switch is /XJ - eXclude Junction points, until such time as you can revert the permissions to what they were originally (good luck to us all!)...

[ChrisGreaves]

Microsoft Social Answers

Has anyone (yet) tried the recommendations for setting in the first answer ("Friday, August 27, 2010 1:15 AM")?
If not, I might have to be the guinea pig.

For Robocopy use, the magic switch is /XJ

Works fine.
Thanks John for passing on this interim workaround.

[John Gray]

I've tried resetting the permissions, but as always with permissions there's always Something that seems to prevent you doing what you wanted. I've not really had a chance yet to demonstrate whether the changes work or not. So go ahead!

What I'd really like is a "change all permissions to the installation default" program!

[ChrisGreaves]

What I'd really like is a "change all permissions to the installation default" program!

Ahhah!
For once I know the answer to this one.
It's called "Recovery Partition"!

I reset my permissions on the notebook last night, following the instructions in the head of that thread, but had rather less success on the netbook.
I will try again this evening.