Broken Windows II presents: The FTP Fiasco by doggitydogs

Welcome to doggitydogs's article on the FTP Fiasco.

Introduction

The FTP Fiasco is an odd series of errors generated when trying to delete FTP backups.

FTP backups are backups of the /public_html/ or root directory of an FTP server.

This can only be caused by Unix/Linux web servers. If you are hosting on a Windows server, you will not experience this problem.

Causes

Windows has the following restrictions:

Linux/Unix does not have these restrictions. Thus, a Linux/Unix directory tree might look like this:

while a Windows directory tree would look like this:

If you back up the contents of a Linux/Unix server/computer (usually an FTP server) onto a Windows computer, Windows ignores this rule, as the names must be legitimate if you have managed to store them elsewhere, right?

But when it comes time to delete them, things get really screwed up.

Symptoms

When you attempt to delete the public_html directory, you get this:

Error Deleting File or Folder
Cannot delete  : The directory is not empty.
    [OK]

My first response to this was:

“So? I'm trying to delete it. What does that have to do with its contents?”

I opened the public_html directory, deleted one folder, and...it's gone!

I kept on deleting one directory at a time until I came to starkow.

When I attempted to delete starkow, it gave me the message again.

Error Deleting File or Folder
Cannot delete  : The directory is not empty.
    [OK]

What the heck? I opened the starkow directory. All it contained was a directory, called  . That's right,  . " ".

When I tried to delete  , it said:

Error Deleting File or Folder
Cannot delete file: Cannot read from the source file or disk.
    [OK]

How is that possible? I just right clicked the file and clicked Delete! How can a file I just clicked on not exist?

Cures

My first instinct, and probably yours, too, was to use a boot CD. But if you do this, it will just go:

Error Deleting File or Folder
Cannot delete  : The directory is not empty.
    [OK]

Now what?

I suggest using Cedrick Collomb's Unlocker, which can be downloaded for Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista at tinyurl.com/5vsylq

After this is installed, just right-click the file and click Unlocker. When the dialog box comes up, select Delete from the drop-down menu and click OK. You will get the following message:

Success
The object was deleted.
    [OK]

and the problem is solved.

If you are using Windows 95/95B/98/98SE/NT/ME/2008/Home/7, I would suggest burning a Linux CD (images are available at
tinyurl.com/cwkzf
just select Live CD from the middle menu) and using it to find and remove the file.

Animated GIF

For those of you who didn't quite follow that and are running Windows 2000-Vista, simply download Cedrick Collomb's Unlocker at
tinyurl.com/5vsylq
and install it. After that, I have created an animated GIF file showing the whole process.

The 37.3 MB animated GIF file can be found at
tinyurl.com/60xyr2

If you are running Windows 95-ME/2008/Home/7, get a Linux live CD image at
tinyurl.com/cwkzf
(select Live CD from the middle menu), burn it to a disc, boot into it, and find and remove the file.

Links

Web version - tinyurl.com/6qhv39
Linux homepage - linux.org
Unlocker homepage - tinyurl.com/aud7k