Bad file extention

[thewolfe]

Copied files from another computer to my computer and I have 1 file that my backup program will not copy. It's a Word doc with an extension of blabla.docbla

Because of the file extension I can not move, delete,rename....it.

It will not open and I can't open it with WordPad, etc.

Also tried SafeMode just for kicks.

Since it's not my file I'm not worried about it except it keeps showing an error when my backup program copies the My Docs folder that the file is in.

Any ideas?

[woodchip]

You have something like sure delete?

[thewolfe]

Nope. Will that delete just one file?

[thewolfe]

Also, I'd really like to keep the file.

[Krom]

Tried renaming it from command prompt?

[Cuda68]

So long as its not Vista, boot to a Linux live CD and then delete it.

[thewolfe]

I'll try a comd prmpt when I have time to figure out the commands. I wasn't good with dos 20 years ago and what little I knew I forgot by know.

[Krom]

Also, even if a file has a funny name or extension it should be completely irrelevant to moving or copying it, names are all abstract in the file system and have nothing to do with the actual physical location of the file. Because of that, errors during operations and problems renaming usually mean there is some sort of corruption either on the disk or in the file system so you should run: \"chkdsk /r\" from the command prompt.

[fliptw]

try rebooting before doing anything to remove any errant locks on the file in question

[TechPro]

Just out of curiosity ... what exactly is the file named? We may be able to help you more specifically if we knew that.

[Cuda68]

Just out of curiosity ... what exactly is the file named? We may be able to help you more specifically if we knew that.

See his first post, second sentence. blabla.docbla - Not sure if he was serious or not though, I have seen dumber names

[Foil]

The only time I've had a bad filename cause issues trying to delete it was when some moronic script decided to put its file in a folder something like

c:\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat... (you get the idea, about 50 of these) ...\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\file.ext

on my Windows box. This of course caused \"filepath length\" errors whenever I tried to delete or move it. Comand-line DOS commands gave the same result. I ended up having to shorten a bunch of the folder names to one character to make the path short enough.

Not sure if my experience there will help, but it might give you an idea.

[AceCombat]

kinda sounds like this is a MSWord temp file, or even better yet, a recovery file

[TechPro]

Well, if the file really is named blabla.docbla ... then chances are his system is not showing the real file extension. Without seeing the real file extension, it can be rather challenging trying to convince Windows to let you do something else with the file.

Of course, it could be simply marked as read-only, or as a system file, or has access rights assigned to it that he doesn't have rights to.

\"docbla\"? yeah, that'd be a dumb name ... I doubt that's the actual file extension.

[thewolfe]

I'm away from the machine with a problem for a day or two so I'll get back to you when I can.

[thewolfe]

Well, I installed a \"slave\" harddrive on the computer I was backing up, backed everything to that and then deleted the files that I had backed up to my computer.

My auto backup program was the only thing that wouldn't recognize the files.

I wanted to add a second hd anyway so that solved my problem and I also know it was my backup program (SecondCopy) and not the file that was giving me the problem.

Thanks for all the good suggestions.

[Cuda68]

OH come on - tell us the name of the file

[thewolfe]

Here's one of them

C:\\Documents and Settings\\Doug\\my documents\\Computer Stuff\\Lovely\\Desktop\\Woman of Excellence Academy\\Kemore Abbey Picture Free Castle Screensaver_files\\Loyola Marymount University EMB Program and trip to Asia_files\\economics\\MBAP 644.doc Corp governance.doc

[Krom]

It is a NTFS filesystem limitation when a pathname is larger than 255 characters things get strange.

[Grendel]

Nah, each path component is limited to 255. The overall path length is limited to 32767 unicode characters. The problem is most likely the name \"blah.doc blub.doc\", screws w/ the extension detection. Sometime a ren blah*.* abc works to get rid of the double extension.

[Krom]

Well it isn't exactly a limit of the NTFS file system, but more a limit of windows/windows explorer itself, try it yourself:

\"E:\\ridiculously long winded test folder to see if huge path names can exceed 255 characters level 0001\\ridiculously long winded test folder to see if huge path names can exceed 255 characters level 0002\\ridiculously long winded test folder to see \" is where windows explorer stopped and wouldn't let me go any further (248 characters), open the folder and right click > new > text document and you get:



I was able to reach 248 characters before it died, how far can you go?

[Grendel]

You are right, it's a Windows limitation tho. Not NTFS :/

Although NTFS allows each path component (directory or filename) to be 255 characters long and paths up to about 32767 characters long, the Windows kernel only supports paths up to 259 characters long.

[Foil]

Yep, same issue I had:

The only time I've had a bad filename cause issues trying to delete it was when some moronic script decided to put its file in a folder something like

c:\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat... (you get the idea, about 50 of these) ...\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\acrobat\\file.ext

on my Windows box. This of course caused "filepath length" errors whenever I tried to delete or move it.