Cannot Change Read Only Attributes

[honkin]

I am still experiencing the dreaded Windows 7 "let us take control of your system" scenarios and I need some help if possible.

As usual, if I create a folder and attempt to save in it, I am denied access, though this is not such an issue, as I use Take Ownership to handle this.

My problem is all of the subfolder in the My Documents folder have Read Only as the attribute and I have tried everything I know to change it.

As a last resort I have used a command prompt and used the attrib command to do the job, but with no success trying various different combinations. I tried just running command normally and then tried it as an administrator, but again no success.

This was the final command I tried attrib -r +a "H:\My Documents\*.*" /S /D but still no success.

Does anyone know a way that will work to remove the read only attributes from all of my folders?

cheers

honkin

 

[curtiswardwell]

Hope this helps, found this on the Microsft wesite : Files showing up as "Read Only" and unable to change this. - Microsoft Answers. If you have not tired this I hope some else on this site can help.

 

[honkin]

cheers curtiswardwell and thanks for your post

Yes, had tried all of that. It's quite frustrating that Microsoft has gone this direction with Windows 7. These are folders that I have created and I am logged in as an administrator, yet I cannot manually right click and change attributes and cannot even use the old DOS method either.

If anyone else has a way that works, I'd be very please to know it.

cheers

honkin

 

[Imperfect1]

Remember that there's a difference between "Ownership" and "Permission." You mention that you've given yourself ownership of the file(s) but have you given yourself permission?
Take Ownership of file - Vista Forums

Also, see if either of these tutorials helps:

You cannot view or change the Read-only or the System attributes of folders in Windows Server 2003, in Windows XP, in Windows Vista or in Windows 7
Read-only File and Folder Attribute

 

[honkin]

cheers Imperfect1

The second link is of no use as using the attrib command is what I have now tried extensively.

I checked the first link you gave me and all folders involved have the following:

Under Group or User names there is only Everyone listed. The permissions for Everyone has everything ticked. It is like that for every folder under My Documents.

It starting to get quite annoying not being able to be in control of folder I create. If I want to rotate a photo in a folder, I have to go through this ludicrous series of events and so far, I am no closer to being in control of my own folders

Frustrating!

thanks for trying

honkin

 

[logicearth]

Folders do not have read-only...why does no one read the properties of a folder? It says right there. "Read-only (Only applies to files in folder)"

 

[fseal]

Logicearth ir right, and this is not a windows 7 thing. The read only flag in the properties for folders has NEVER had anything to so with the folder actually being read only. (Well maybe in the DOS days...)

It is an overloaded flag: "Windows Explorer uses the Read-Only attribute to determine whether or not the folder is customized." (Linux actually overloads the execute flag for folders in the same way!)

The only real question is, why does that checkbox even show up in the GUI :/

So beyond trying to unset a flag that can't be unset and doesn't mean what it says; is there any other specific problem? THat H:\My Documents is a folder YOU created right? Or is it an old windows folder created by a different user? ANy folder you create yourself from the root of any drive will automatically have all your permissions and you should be able to write anything to it any time. (Assuming your not on a domain network that an admin has control over)

 

[rraod]

You need to login as an administrator to proceed further to complete these instructions

You say you have only Everyone in the permissions list of the folder inside My Documents. But you should also have the following users/groups in this list.

Administrators
System
Your id.

1. Add these users/groups in the permissions list.

2. Give full permissions to each of the user starting from Administrator and pressing apply everytime you change permissions for each user. Always remember remove the check mark for include inheritable permissons from the object's parent folder and to put check mark to replace all permissons child object permissions with these permissions. Press apply button.

3. Now go to Owner tab and select the Administrators to take ownershop of these folders.

4. Repeat step 2 and verify whether the permissions you set earlier held good or not. If not repeat the above steps again.

5. Make sure you do not have any deny permissions set. Deny permissions have an overriding permisson over Allow permission. Everyone does not automatically give all permissions to everyone if any deny permissions are set. If any Deny permissions are set, then remove the check mark from deny and keep check mark on allow.

Finally delete the Everyone user at the end of the process. Never use Everyone user. Using this is very risky as it gives permissions to all and sundry.

 

[honkin]

to fseal and logicearth

Thanks for your replies, but had either of you actually read my posts you would have realised, what the problem was. I indicated I wanted to rotate some images in a folder.

Please explain this, if you can fseal. If I have a subfolder of My Documents called Photos and I wish to rotate a photo in Windows Explorer, why am I greeted with a Windows error message that says specifically "You cannot rotate this image. The file might be in use or open in another program, or the file or folder might be read-only"? If folders cannot be read only, why would I be denied being able to rotate my images and why would Windows present me with that message if folders cannot be read-only? The individual photos all have archive attributes and none were open in any apps at the time. Please only answer a thread if you have something constructive to add and know what you are talking about.

To rroad, thanks for your response. It seems to have worked a treat. The images are now able to be manipulated and all folders now see to have the correct users/groups

regards

honkin

 

[fseal]

Well as a matter of fact I did read your posts and I DID answer you, in two ways. You complicated your own post with multiple issues. I and logicearth cleared up the read only flag issue and I also asked if your folder were created by a second or old account which would be the only reason why you would even HAVE to apply rraod's fix in the first place and before going that compluicated route was trying to verify if it was needed.

/My/ suggestion would be that when you are trying to ask for help that you actually listen to the answers and requests for feedback and in the future, try not to bite the hand that is feeding you.

 

[rraod]

It is nice to hear that you could resolve the folder and file permissions problem under your My Documents. I think the main culprit is the missing SYSTEM account.

By default, the SYSTEM account is granted full control to all files on an NTFS volume. Here the SYSTEM account has the same functional privileges as the administrator account.

The SYSTEM account is used by the operating system and by services that run under Windows. There are many services and processes within Windows that need the capability to log on internally and they use the SYSYEM account for this purpose.

Without the SYSTEM account in the file/folder permissions, The OS could not perform certain tasks on the files. That is why windows was giving an error when you try to rotate an image in these folders.