Because of a 'corrupt' system-config file (in win xp-pro I reinstalled with set-up disk. Most applications are in Prog files but, although, my daughter's account (with password) opens, her folder 'Documents and settings' has error message "not accessible. Access is denied".
I should be grateful if anyone could throw some light on the subject as Anna really requires access to that particular folder.
Thnx

Hi

Did you try Logging in as Administrator in Safe Mode?

Try sfcscan also
Chari

Chari,
that suggestion didn't work either.
If you have any more ideas I'm willing, if not so able, to try.
Ed

Ellergreen,

I believe this link has the solution for your problem.

edit: broken link fixed.

Thanks Chewy.
I printed out the instrs from that link. (Large fonts for me rheumy old eyes!!) and followed them to the letter. Sadly this one folder,still, will not grant access.
Do you know any other method that I could try?
Many thnx Ed

Ellergreen,

I don't have much time right now, i have to run out for an errand.

I am surprised the link I gave you didn't work. At any rate, at this point I would be inclined to think it's a permission related problem for which you could use the cacls tool. However, I know this is a tool to access the system volume information folder and I do not know if the following will work or not.

Hopefully Grogan will see this thread and confirm if this is correct. Log in as the administrator and type cmd at the run command. At the dos prompt, type the following:

cacls "driveletter:\System Volume Information" /E /G username:F

Delete any files you see, and reboot the system.

Afterwards, log in with your daughter's account and see if you can access the user's setting.

Using the CACLS utility should just do the things included in the link and isn't really need in XP Pro but I suppose it's worth ago.

The command is right to give access to the System Volume Information folder but as this case is the Documents and Settings folder it needs tweaking.

To give access -
cacls "driveletter:\Documents and Settings" /E /G username:F

EDIT - Oh, and I think Chewy was thinking about the SVI folder when he said "delete anything you find" - you may not want to do that unless it turns out that the files are corrupted.

And just put of interest - you didn't have the Documents and Settings folder encrypted did you?

The reason why i suggested Ellergreen clear out the system vol. folder is that I thought there might be something in there that's causing the symptoms. When the system restore is turned on that's where XP saves restore point information. Since Ellergreen has already done a 'dirty' isntall, i don't see any danger in deleting the contents of that folder considering that the 'dirty' install will wipe out any previously existing restore points.

Upon research, it seems there is other ifnormation contained in the folder. There is one that should not be deleted. Ellergreen, if you can access the System volume information folder, you should not delete the tracking.log file.

The files you can safely delete are related to the system restore points (already mentioned) and the indexing service which most home user PCs don't utilize anyway. As an added measure of safety, you can copy the files to a floppy or a CD-R before deleting them.

I thought you were advising using the cacls utility to gain ownership of the Documents and Settings folder - I doubt the SVI folder has anything to do with the problem per se.

Oh, and the cacls utility is not a tool just for getting into the SVI folder - it's used to modify the Access Control List of any file/folder to change access/ownership from the command line.

Dear all,
Erm, now I'm confused!
As far as I'm aware the folder was not encrypted but she used to save all her work to her desktop folder? (Surely there must be Winxp backup somewhere??)
I'm not at all certain where her 'old' desktop icons might be, they disappeared in the 'dirty' reinstall, although I did find my 'old' ones (don't ask where!) and put them back on my start up screen.
Anna is quite anxious for the recovery of said folder 'cos she has her Univerity placements soon.
Thanx for your interest.
Ed

Lets just recap what you've done then.

After some corruption you reinstalled XP from the bootable set-up disks - did you do a 'Repair Installation' or did you install to the same partition in a different folder?

You have tried the process in the link and tried using the CACLS utility from a command prompt to try and gain access to the Documents and Settings folder to no avail?

Have you run chkdsk at any point?

Try running Chkdsk and then try and gain ownership again - unless you had them encrypted or the folder is corrupt in some way you should be able to claim it and access it.

The problem here maybe the original reason for the corruption that lead to the reinstall in the first place. The hard drive maybe crapping out or the partition table maybe damaged. This is why you should keep your documents on a seperate partition or hard drive so if you loose the OS you can clean install to C: and all your docs are safe.

This, so far is an achievement for me. Where the heck do I go from here??
I'm still so grateful for all of your interest.
Ed
"C:\>cacls C:\documents and Settings/ E / G Anna:F
Displays or modifies access control lists (ACLs) of files

CACLS filename ]

For a start if that's a copy and paste then the syntax of the command is all wrong.

You have at the C prompt -

C:\>cacls C:\documents and Settings/ E / G Anna:F

You should have -

C:\>cacls "C:\Documents and Settings" /E /G Anna:F

noting the position of the speech marks and the spaces for the switches. The command types out as-

cacls*space**Quotation Mark*C:\Documents and Settings*Quotation Mark**space*/E*space*/G*space*Anna:F*ENTER*

To be honest I've never really had that much luck when using calcs - even when I use the correct syntax it never seems to do it. Maybe Grogan has a pearl of wisdom concerning calcs.