In reply to a post by RobertoS:

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

That's not normal *3. All my users, Admins & Limited, have full permission for all their own Documents folders on both XP & Vista. Also Admins have full permissions to everyone else's Documents folders.

I'm a great one for manipulating permissions, but I've never touched anyone's Documents folders, honest guv!

The permissions appear to be correct, but access is still denied. It's almost as though I'm not being recognised as me via one path, but accepted via another.

But - more to come, as I have found something very odd.

Are you clicking a junction point rather than the actual pictures folder? (check post above)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

That's not normal *3. All my users, Admins & Limited, have full permission for all their own Documents folders on both XP & Vista. Also Admins have full permissions to everyone else's Documents folders.

I'm a great one for manipulating permissions, but I've never touched anyone's Documents folders, honest guv!

The permissions appear to be correct, but access is still denied. It's almost as though I'm not being recognised as me via one path, but accepted via another.

But - more to come, as I have found something very odd.

Simples!!!

Vista and 7 no longer use the same file paths as XP etc.

In XP, a users music would be in "C:\documents and settings\<username>\my documents\my music"

That is, a subdirectory of their "my documents" folder, which in itself was within the "documents and settings" folder.

Vista onwards saw fit to change this file path to "C:\users\<username>\my music". Note that this is NOT a subdirectory of my documents, nor is it within the documents and settings folder.

As Microsoft realise that some programmers will have hardcoded "C:\documents and settings\<username>\my documents\my music\" as where music is stored, there is a link which shows in my computer (but isn't an actual directory, and won't open if clicked) within the C: drive called "Documents and settings" that points to the Users folder, and another link within the "My Documents" folder which points to "My Music", which is now parallel with my documents rather than within it.

The purpose of this is not for you to navigate via the old path, but so that a hardcoded link will still work. If you try to open these links, you get "access denied".

Windows 7 complicates stuff slightly more by including the stupid "libraries" rubbish.

In reply to a post by nemeth782:

Windows 7 complicates stuff slightly more by including the stupid "libraries" rubbish.

Does winsxs still have the same problems (excessive disk space usage and AV scanning) in W7 that Vista has?

The W7 Winsxs folder is not a normal folder and the size shown is deceptive. It should not be touched.

Ah, the old Junctions! I imagined Bob would have long known about these on Vista.

In reply to a post by AEP:

That's not normal. A user should have permission to his own folders.

What does confuse some people is that the Administrator doesn't, by default, have access to other users folders. But this makes sense to me as it means that an Administrator can't access another user's private data without them being aware of the fact.

See my reply a second ago to XRaySpex. I am the only "User" apart from the disabled "Guest".

However, the oddity I have found is:-

Using Windows Explorer on the Win 7 there are two "My Documents" folders at the same level under Bob! But with differences. Not only that, but examining the Vista machine over the network there are two there as well - but using Windows Explorer on the Vista machine only one shows up. Hmmmm.

Permissions on both on Win 7 are identical but the icon and the Properties are different. Both are a "folder" icon, but one has the bottom left corner overlaid with a small square containing a curved up-arrow. Clicking that one gives Access denied. Its properties say it is a file folder, but the only further information is the modification date and time, which is as near dammit as the one without the arrow box.

Clicking the plain icon gives acces to the folder contents, which are "My xxxxx", all of which have the arrow-box in the left bottom corner of their icons. Clicking them gives Access denied, although all of these show full permissions to Users\Bob and Administrators - Bob being the only obvious Administrator. The properties of this My Documents include the usual size and numbers of sub-folders and files data.

Below the two "My Documents" are further My Music/Pictures/Videos, without the arrow-box. Straight in, no problem. On the Vista machine there are corresponding folders without the "My", an IIRC there was no problem with those either.

One line of thought that has come to me is that I am seeing both an Administrator view of the whole shebang, overlaid with the private view of Bob, on both machines. Next step is to add a non-Administrator user and see how that behaves, and perhaps another Admin user and see how well that accesses these inaccessible Bob folders..

I don't think that was the Q.

So what? If you feel like answering it, do so.

Instead of navigating to Desktop=>Bob, which is not the actual storage, it is always clearer to navigate to My Computer=>C:\Users\Bob.

The folders with the curved up-arrow are just Junctions (sort of shortcuts) put in to maintain compatibility with XP at low level and are not accessible in Explorer.

You can see this clearer in a Command Prompt by navigating to C:\Users\Bob and doing a "dir /a". Also at this level the Junctions are accessible.

I would have thought you would have long known about these on Vista.

EDIT: Please forgive me if you find this post fatuous

Edited by XRaySpeX (Thu 21-Jul-11 23:03:02)

I can't! I don't possess W7! So I don't bother to offer fatuous remarks!