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I've Been Tagged

Members of the ISP-Tech list help disinfect an FTP server that was being used to serve applications from an inaccessible directory.

[May 30, 2002]

On the ISP-Tech list in May, RS presented a problem:

"We have a customer who has an FTP Server with an anonymous upload directory. Somebody 'tagged' it: somehow, they created files with a space before the filename. NT cannot access these files to rename, remove, or even change the attributes-nor can any other third party program we can find. Does anybody know of a way to remove the files, short of reformatting the drive?"

A number of respondents offered various suggestions:

[GG noted] "Deleting the whole directory usually works. Also try to delete the file at a DOS prompt, holding down the Alt key and typing 0160 on the keypad to insert the space character."

[VJ agreed] "Try dir /x on NT. Then you can use the DOS name to delete it."

[CS countered] "Put quotes around the filename. I just created a file on my server called ' yyy.txt'. Then I deleted it using del ' yyy.txt'. The same thing should work on an NT machine."

[CF added] "You can also try logging into the FTP server with an FTP client and deleting the directory from there."

RS dashed all their hopes:

"Thanks for the advice, folks, but no go. All I get back are various errors, usually about 'invalid directory name' or 'cannot find the file.' It's funny: that error should say 'cannot find directory'. I failed to mention in the original message that the 'tags' are directories, not file names."

Others came back with more ideas:

[TD recalled] "I went through this once. I think placing the name in quotes is the solution, but it won't complete if the subdirectories also have abnormal names. Then you have to change to the lowest subdirectory, then use the name in quotes to delete strangely named files, then go up one directory and remove that subdirectory, etc., until all of them are gone. It took a lot of effort to get it out, but we did it, and it did not require a re-format."

[RM added] "You should be able to navigate down from a command prompt by using the short 8.3 DOS names for folders. Then you can delete the 8.3 file names and folders. Use dir /x to see them. For example, use 'rmdir /s cyberc~1' to remove the /cybercash directory and subdirectories. You might need to descend into the tree to get the invalid ones."

With that help, RS found the answer:

"Did it! We found that we have to navigate down to the one directory above the lowest at a command prompt, using the 8.3 names. Then we can use POSIX rm.exe to remove the subdirectory. This seems to lock some permission, and any further action gets 'permission denied.' So then we have to reboot the server, and do the whole thing again for each directory in turn."

—End