Backup Error 5: Access is denied - Reinstall did not help

Hi all,

I updated Dopus to the current version 10.5.1 and find out that I got the "Error code 5: Access is denied" whenever I try to do a backup. Nothing has changed in the setup of my drives or directories, be it in terms of security rights or anything else actually. I pointed the backup file to a different drive or on the desktop to no avail. I did a re-installation and rebooted but this did not solve the problem either. I haven't installed any new program or changed anything related to rar or zip programs or even modified Dopus handling of those files in my configuration (i.e. WinRar is my compression/decompression program). Thanks for the help.

If you go to /dopusdata, /dopusglobaldata and /dopuslocaldata, are you able to zip up everything below those three folders using Opus, or do you get a similar error (or some other error)?

Hi Leo,

Am I correct to assume that you mean to zip up by "using Dopus" is to select the different options such as:
Backup images
Backup sounds
Backup miscellaneous data
Backup local state data
and see if everything is done without error? Then yes, all went fine (sounds, miscellaneous data, local state data) except with the option "images" throwing the "Error 5: Access is denied".

However if my aforementioned understanding is incorrect, then I don't know how use Dopus to zip these directories:
%APPDATA%\GPSoftware\Directory Opus
%PROGRAMDATA%\GPSoftware\Directory Opus
%LOCALAPPDATA%\GPSoftware\Directory Opus

Select a directory and then use the Archive Files button on the toolbar, then click OK.

I used the Archive Files button and chose to test with 3 out of 4 of the available options (7z, rar, zipx, except tar). All zipping were done without errors.

The default Zip mode is the one to try, as that's what the Backup function uses. The other modes, including ZipX, all go via a separate plugin rather than the internal Zip code.

If you want, send me a private message with the three zip files and I'll see if I get the same problem using the backup function with them as my configuration.

If you're familiar with Process Monitor, making a log of what dopus.exe is trying to access may also reveal where things are going wrong.

Just out of curiosity and because I only have problems with Dopus since version 10.5, I reinstalled version 10.2 and lo and behold, the backup went without a hitch. Again. What gives :open_mouth: ?

However, for the sake of troubleshooting, I re-updated to version 10.5.1 (and because I'm a masochist I suppose :unamused: ).

I do use Process Monitor instead of Windows Task Manager but I'm not sure I know how to generate a log file for Dopus. I restarted a fresh Process Monitor, launched a backup operation and use the function Help/Log but just get an empty log pane. Am I doing something wrong?

When I use the Zip function (that comes with zip and email), I get the error "The system cannot find the path specified. (3)" and no zip files is created:

You're thinking of Process Explorer. Process Monitor is a different tool. (I always get the two names confused as well. It's a pain that the names are so similar when the tools themselves are so different.)

[ul][li]What about when creating a Zip using the Archive Files button?

(Using Zip & Email adds extra places where things could go wrong -- e.g. if no appropriate mail client is installed -- which may confuse matters.)

[/li]
[li]Is there anything unusual about your user profile path? e.g. Non-ascii characters in your account name (shouldn't matter, but might in some unexpected way, so let's look at them to rule out the possibility), or using junctions/links to move folders around?

[/li]
[li]What about your temp directory? Have you moved that to somewhere else, or anything like that? If you did move it, how was it moved? Were both the env-vars and registry updated? Are junctions/links being used to re-locate it?[/li][/ul]

You know Leo, what really puzzle me is that everything works fine until I switch to 10.5.x. Then I have to spend quite an amount of time to try and fix something that has not been changed from my side although somehow feels like my own doing :imp: It drives me crazy :smiling_imp: .

My bad about this one. I PM'd to you my log file with Dopus process while doing a backup. Hope this will help.

[quote]What about when creating a Zip using the Archive Files button?

(Using Zip & Email adds extra places where things could go wrong -- e.g. if no appropriate mail client is installed -- which may confuse matters.)[/quote]
Actually, it seems to me that it doesn't as it never gets to the emailing phase because all the paths are not available. Therefore, I don't get the error about mail client and such. I just get the detailed files error #3 with the Zip & Email function.

So, this time, I used the function button "CreateFolder ARCHIVE" (hope it's the right one finally) to generate a zip file and it did. But the files in all three locations are indeed created but they are all empty inside and without any error warning.

My user profile path doesn't have special non-ascii characters, symbols or even numbers. It uses exclusively some of the 26 letters of the modern English alphabet.

I have not moved my Temp directory nor changed anything on my system including installation of programs, be it configuration or hardware wise.
I do use junctions but for troubleshooting purpose, I removed them to have a "clean" environment. Moreover, I don't see why it could have been the culprit as it has never been a problem until now.

I don't understand why these problem occurs and repeat that nothing has changed in both my system and Dopus configuration. The point that keeps chafing me is that when I reinstall version 10.2, the backup is done without any problem. It looks quite similar to the problem I had earlier with the Ctrl+point select issue (which turned out to be a programming adjustment that Jon corrected for version 10.5.1).

CreateFolder ARCHIVE just creates an empty folder. That's all it's supposed to do.

This is the button I am talking about:

If you're using custom toolbars, you can turn on the standard Operations toolbar to access it. If you've modified that toolbar, the command to run is:

Copy ADDTOARCHIVE HERE

I don't know either but we have no other reports of anything similar so there must be something specific either to your Opus configuration or your Windows setup that is triggering it. Once we work out what that is we can work out what to do. If it turns out to be a bug we can fix it.

Process Monitor was only set to log registry operations (no file operations) so the log only has 19 lines which are of no use, unfortunately.

Please use Filter -> Reset Filter within Process Monitor to make it log everything.

The three config archives were all empty (22 byte zip files) too, I guess as a result of using the wrong button/command as per above.

You said earlier the "Images" option was what triggered the access denied error. If you go into your /dopusdata/Images folder, what do you see?

[quote="leo"]CreateFolder ARCHIVE just creates an empty folder. That's all it's supposed to do.

This is the button I am talking about:
[attachment=0]wc2362_dopus.png[/attachment]

If you're using custom toolbars, you can turn on the standard Operations toolbar to access it. If you've modified that toolbar, the command to run is:
Copy ADDTOARCHIVE HERE[/quote]

Hopefully, I got it right this time.

[quote]
Process Monitor was only set to log registry operations (no file operations) so the log only has 19 lines which are of no use, unfortunately.

Please use Filter -> Reset Filter within Process Monitor to make it log everything.

The three config archives were all empty (22 byte zip files) too, I guess as a result of using the wrong button/command as per above.[/quote]

I'm PM'ing to you the modified files.

Hi Jon,

I see Folder Tabs, Standard Toolbar, Status Bar.
It's correct that when Zip & Email was used, the folder Images triggered first the error #3 but then came Icons, Icon Cache Roaming, Layouts, Libraries, Lister Styles, Logs, Photo Sharing, Program State, Scripts, Sounds, Tab Groups, Themes, Tools, UserCommands. For the dopuslocaldata folder, the ones that triggered the error were Icon Cache, State Data, Thumbnail Cache while in dopusglobaldata, it was Buttons, Consoles, Directory Opus 10 Program Certificate.txt, dopus.cert, Global Data, Icons, Scripts, Utilities.

I'm attaching hereafter the whole tree of the dopusdata directory just in case you may need it:

Hi,

I have (I guess) the exactly same problem. Hope to be able to give you som more info to solve the issue.

My Dopus version is v10.5.1.0 (4848), running under Windows 8 Pro, 32-bit.

((By the way : This problem does not occur running under Windows XP Home)).

I first found this error under v10.5.0.6 BETA and hoped it would have been solved in the stable version — but alas not. Under v10.5.0.0 (stable) all works fine.

During my tries to solve the problem myself I have noticed a couple of things which might help pinpoint the problem :

  • The first part of the backup process looks to be going OK . . . the progress bar progresses to about one tenth from its final end.

  • I can see, that during the backup Dopus places a couple of files in the Windows "Temp" folder, and that Dopus sets some very special (peculiar ?) permissions on these files: It is not possible to read the files, and it is not possible to "Take Ownership" of these files.

I have taken a Process Monitor log of the going ons (attached). Below are listed some time-points (from the log) which I think possibly could give you a hint of where the problem lies. I have to admit, however, that I'm not a supercharged programmer, so it's only my best guesses . . .

10:31:21 , 351'623'4 : First look at target for the backup. All is going well.

10:31:21 , 525'219'0 : Creates backup target file - and starts writing to it. All is going well.

And now, three examples where Dopus runs into problems (this scenario occurs more than three times) :

A: 10:31:22 , 688'615'8 : ...\Temp... .dop\Buttons : Found !

B: 10:31:22 , 697'604'9 : ...\Temp... .dop\Buttons : NOT found ! (I think this is the first occurrence of this error).

A: 10:31:22 , 865'884'9 : ...\Temp... .dop\ConfigFiles : Found ! (This example chosen, because the two points are very close).

B: 10:31:22 , 867'568'2 : ...\Temp... .dop\ConfigFiles : NOT found !

A: 10:31:24 , 384'427'9 : ...\Temp... .dop : Found ! (This example chosen, because it's the .dop-file itself).

B: 10:31:24 , 394'669'8 : ...\Temp... .dop : NOT found !

I hope it will be possible to pinpoint the reason for this behavior. For the time being I take manual backups of the settings instead of using the built-in Dopus function. So the problem is not an extreme priority for me — however it is a nuisance ... and it really ought to be functioning.

Belion

Uploaded attachment : Process Monitor log-file.
Process Monitor Logfile_.7z (521 KB)

Hi belion,

Thank you very much for chiming in. I do hope that Jon and Leo will be able to solve the issue with both our inputs this time because I don't want to have to do my backups the "hard way". My educated guess as a layperson is that the key interesting pointers are the fact that the problems don't arise for you with XP and only starting from version 10.5.0.6 BETA. I installed this latter beta version for a very brief moment to try to solve my issue with the Ctrl+point-select and remember that I did see such a warning (error 5). For me, this backup problem did not appear until this version 10.5.1. Therefore, I can only assume that there's something that is not playing well with the backup function since v10.5.0.6 BETA only.

I don't know if this has anything to do with the issue at hand but, after my numerous try-outs with different versions today, when I re-upgraded from 10.5.0 to 10.5.1, I very briefly noticed that the installer showed [C:\Program Files (x86)] in the path towards the end of the process. It was quite odd because I have a 64-bit system. I redid the installation again (from 10.5.1 to the same version) but could not make the path reappear. I'm a bit wary of the whole testing so have not tried the real deal, i.e. from 10.5.0 to 10.5.1, yet, where the strange path apparition popped up just to re-confirm my sighting.

Thanks for sending your config. (Not sure why all the archives were self-extracting .exe files so I think some of the instructions still got confused somewhere, but I have the config now anyway).

I haven't isolated the exact cause yet but my guess is that the problem is you are treating Opus's config directories as a place to store a lot of your own random files as well as shortcuts to various other folders.

When I get a chance I'll work out exactly which files are causing the problem, but my advice so far is to stop messing with the config directories (that includes customizing their icons, which will create hidden files below the customised folder) and storing random things inside them. Opus expects the config dirs to contain certain things arranged in a specific way and they aren't a general user documents folder.

It's because the function Copy ADDTOARCHIVE HERE is greyed out unless I chose one of the compression option (Archive type) or only if I choose the option "Make self-extracting archive":

Thus, this is the reason why the first time you asked for the zipped files, I wrote to you that I used the options to zip with 7z, rar and zipx. Until you confirmed that the function Copy ADDTOARCHIVE is the one to use and I noticed and chose the self-extracting archive option, I was able to create the files you asked for. Therefore, you see, I didn't have any other options left because the remaining options can't clear out the greyed-out OK allowing me to do the zipping.

I cleared all attributes of all directories and files in all three locations and deleted all shortcuts and desktop.ini files. The backup is still locked at error 5.

It's probably a gender thing because I like to pretty-up my directories and it helps me find them with just a glance.

At the risk of repeating myself, the backup function worked until 10.5.06 BETA despite all the things that aren't supposed to be in my Opus config directories and my configuration hasn't changed for a very long time. I don't understand why functions start to break-up for me since 10.5. There are many things going on under the hood that I most certainly don't understand but the improvements have a knack to mess up with my working Dopus.

Another point is that I remember that backups started to get slower with 10.5.0, especially towards the end of the process around the ninetieth percent, but still completed successfully. I hope this additional piece of information will help you and Jon narrow down the culprit.

Ah okay, that makes sense. You've turned off Preferences / Zip & Other Archives / Zip Files / Enable internal Opus Zip support so almost all of the zip functionality in Opus is disabled.

I cleared all attributes of all directories and files in all three locations and deleted all shortcuts and desktop.ini files. The backup is still locked at error 5.[/quote]

The problem is in the Icons directory.

The files selected in the screenshot below are the ones you need to delete. (Note that the screenshot scrolls down.)

Essentially, delete everything except for the 18 .ico files (near the bottom) and the .dis file (near the top).


The Lan's Icon Set.dis file near the top should probably be moved up a level, in the Icons folder itself rather than the [bin] sub-folder, if you actually want to use those icons. Opus will completely ignore the .dis file when it's in a sub-folder like that, so it's just wasting space right now. But it's probably also harmless so you can keep it there if you wish.

You would normally import a .dis file into your config using Preferences / Toolbars / Icons, which automatically copies the .dis file to the appropriate place directly below the Icons folder.

It's the shortcuts like ". Dopus Buttons [C:]" with Unicode tricks to make them look like they have file paths which were causing the problem, but none of that extra stuff should be in the Icons config dir. (Shortcuts to various places, a directory full of user commands, copies of background images (that are also in the Images folder with different names), desktop.ini and icons used to customize the look of the config directories themselves, your Opus 9 and Opus 10 registration details...)

While it seems to only be these particular files in the Icons folder which were causing problems with the backup functionality, I suggest cleaning up the other config dirs as well, since many of them have similar things which shouldn't be there and may cause other problems now or in the future. Also the shortcuts, folder-icon customisations and ".------------" folders at the root of the config shouldn't be needed and may cause problems.

Basically, use Opus's Preferences and Customize user interfaces to make config changes rather than going into the config directories and changing things by hand. Don't spent time in the config directories or use them to store shortcuts to other places or make them look pretty; you should be looking at those directories as little as possible (almost never; it's almost never needed). Let Opus manage its own config dirs.

The only thing you might need to manually copy into the config directories is individual Icons, Images and Sounds. (And the special Scripts folder if you use that for USB Export.)

If there are parts of the configuration which you've been manually editing and you don't know where the user interface for them is, just ask and we'll help. That sort of question is usually really easy to answer so you'll get a reply very quickly, as long as one of us is awake. :slight_smile:

Not much changed between 10.5.0.6-beta and 10.5.1.0. (The four changes are listed here. If we made significant changes after 10.5.0.6-beta then we would have released another beta before 10.5.1.0.)

I've checked and the problem occurs with 10.5.0.6 as well, so you probably just hadn't triggered it yet.

The problem is triggered by creating the ". Dopus Buttons [C:]"-style shortcuts with unusual unicode characters in them below the Icons folder, then doing a backup, then a restore, then another backup, and then another restore. If you then try another backup you'll get the error.

I'm still looking into exactly what is going wrong with those unicode characters, and if there's a bug somewhere we will fix it, but we will still never support or guarantee that Opus will work if you put random files into its config directories. Put that stuff somewhere else and use the UI to make config changes. Only manually go to or modify the configuration directories as a last resort.

Probably because of all the stuff in your config dir. :slight_smile: It looks duplicate copies of several config directories have been made by mistake, accumulating a mess of files that will increase the backup time. The copies of the Images and User Commands files into the Icons directory may have been from an accidental drag & drop. Avoiding that kind of accident is another reason to avoid making manual changes to the config directories.

Hi Leo,

Thanks for looking at my trouble. I'm writing a short reply to let you know I'll look into your suggestions for remedial and get back to you in a few days because I'm swamped right now.

Hi Leo,

Spring has finally come to Denmark — and with spring comes gardening. That's why I've not been at my computer for the last two days. However, seeing that you are focusing on the point <copying from your post Tue Apr 16, 2013 10:50 am > :

"I haven't isolated the exact cause yet but my guess is that the problem is you are treating Opus's config directories as a place to store a lot of your own random files as well as shortcuts to various other folders."

. . . I just want to add to my earlier post (Tue Apr 16, 2013 6:28 am ), that I has not been doing any dabbling with Dopus's files or folders — and I have the (exact ?) same problem.

And I still find it weird that Dopus cannot see the files it has created itself in the ...\Temp.... .dop\ folder (as shown in the attached Process Monitor log to my earlier posting).

Another thing — I noticed that chooquette wrote in post Tue Apr 16, 2013 3:34 pm (copy) :

"Another point is that I remember that backups started to get slower with 10.5.0, especially towards the end of the process around the ninetieth percent, . . . "

As I wrote in my earlier post, my backup stops with the error message "Access is denied" when the progress bar has progressed to about one tenth from its final end. Is that just a coincidence, or ???

I know, these are only some very small bits — but I thought, better to post them than not to . . .