Need some computer help

[Star of Penumbra]

My problem is that whenever I select a certain subfolder, or any of the folders it's in, Explorer crashes. What I need to know is how to delete this folder without having to select it.

 

[Weird Harold]

My problem is that whenever I select a certain subfolder, or any of the folders it's in, Explorer crashes. What I need to know is how to delete this folder without having to select it.

You can add/delete files and folders from the Open menu of most programs or from the results of a Find Files/Folders search.

If it causes other programs to crash when you select it, You can probably delete it in MSDOS mode or possibly delete it from Safe Mode.

 

[Star of Penumbra]

It crashes no matter how I select it. I've already tried to delete it via Firefox. How would I delete it via MSDOS?

 

[Weird Harold]

It crashes no matter how I select it. I've already tried to delete it via Firefox. How would I delete it via MSDOS?

Reboot and hold the control key down to get the boot menu and choose boot to DOS.

Use the dir and change directory commands to find and go to the parent folder of the folder you want to delete -- i.e. type DIR /W to find the DOS name of the folders in the path to the problem folder. for example, C:\Program Files shows as C:\PROGRA~1 in DOS.

Once you find the folder, use the Delete command to delete the contents. Type DEL baddir\*.* (where "baddir" is the DOS name of the problem folder)

You might need to use the attribute command to turn off the system, Hidden, or Read Only attributes before you can delete everything -- ATTR baddir\*.* -R-A-S-H

Once you've deleted everything in the folder, you can use RD Baddir to remove the folder.

Note: I've never used DOS mode under Win XP, but the commands syntax has been the same since MSDOS 4.0 -- three versions before Win 95 was released -- and work through every version up to Win 2K. I have no particular reason to believe they don't work for XP too.

 

[grungalunga]

I know this is a bit late - but what was the folder named?

Windows is a bit "dedede", if the file name is more than 255 characters, or has the wrong punctuatins in it, it will go apeshit on you. Happened to my boss yesterday. I had to highlight the folder and rename it something SIMPLE. once i did that, everything was fine

 

[cd1_christine]

You've never used XP DOS mode...

Note: I've never used DOS mode under Win XP, but the commands syntax has been the same since MSDOS 4.0 -- three versions before Win 95 was released -- and work through every version up to Win 2K. I have no particular reason to believe they don't work for XP too.

Youv'e never used DOS mode in XP because there isn't one. Unless that's what you're calling the recovery console, but I wouldn't send any non-computer-tech into that unless I hated them.
Although Star, you can get to a command prompt by going Start->All Programs->Accessories->Command Prompt.

Then you just use 'cd' to change folders to where you want to go, 'dir' to see where you currently are, 'attrib -h -r -s' and then 'del *.*' to erase all the files in the folder, and finally, 'cd ..' and rmdir 'badfoldername' to get rid of the folder.

The other alternative is to use a file manager other than Windows Explorer. Install Total Commander, or LiteStep. Total Commander runs within Explorer, but doesn't have to use Explorer API's to do file management. It's quite unixy in the way it works, so any Linux geek will probably like it. Very powerful.
LiteStep is a complete Explorer replacement, that changes your whole desktop around. It also looks somewhat unixy, but the last version I tried put a pair of icons on the desktop: "Switch to LiteStep", and "Switch to Explorer". That way, it was just a double click to go back and forth.