unable to delete icon ~ item not found message  

KeithM said:

d

The File not found errors remind me of problems many experienced when Controlled Folder Access first came on the scene. You might try disabling that while trying to rid yourself of this problem.

1. Open the Start Menu & begin typing "Controlled". Controlled Folder Access should be offered as a result.
2. Open & turn off Controlled Folder Access.

I did try to open the controlled folder access but I get a message stating "Page not available Your IT administrator has limited access to some areas of this app, and the item you tried to access is not available. Contact IT helpdesk for more information." when I click okay it takes me to security at a glance.

I am the only user and admin on this pc so there is not IT administrator and I have no idea how to get access to that controlled folder access.

I will review the rest of the steps you have given and see where that gets me. Thank You

I found this from Microsoft; maybe it will help, maybe not. So far, I've never had your problem, so . . .

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/mic...o365-worldwide

I don't see that anyone has given you the link to @Brink's tutorial on Controlled Folder Access, so maybe this will help?

How to Enable or Disable Controlled Folder Access in Windows 10

Try3 said:

1 Boot from a USB Drive - TenForumsTutorials

I was able to boot from the usb with no problem. However, after getting to the command prompt being open and typing notepad a notepad appears and I typed in
-select Open
-set Files of type to All files
-click on This PC

but there is no screen like you have shown - I just have the notepad with the information I typed and the usual options to save the file. I tried clicking to save to and get to the desktop but that did not work either.

I am apparently not doing something correctly. I tried exiting and shutting down and then tried again but I am obviously doing something incorrectly. I also tried typing the information that you stated to the command prompt but that didn't work either.

I just know it is going to be something so silly when you tell me what I am missing that I am going to want to kick myself. I just can not figure out how to get to that screen shot you posted.

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Wynona said:

I don't see that anyone has given you the link to @Brink's tutorial on Controlled Folder Access, so maybe this will help?




How to Enable or Disable Controlled Folder Access in Windows 10

I will go and check out that link now. Thank You

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I went to that link and tried using the 2nd option using power shell but this is what I got.

Windows PowerShellCopyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.Try the new cross-platform PowerShell https://aka.ms/pscore6PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> Set-MpPreference -EnableControlledFolderAccess EnabledSet-MpPreference : A general error occurred that is not covered by a more specific error code.At line:1 char:1+ Set-MpPreference -EnableControlledFolderAccess Enabled+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (MSFT_MpPreference:root\Microsoft\...FT_MpPreference) [Set-MpPreference], CimException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : HRESULT 0x800106ba,Set-MpPreferencePS C:\WINDOWS\system32>

I copied and pasted the command line directly from the link you gave me

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KeithM said:

d

The File not found errors remind me of problems many experienced when Controlled Folder Access first came on the scene. You might try disabling that while trying to rid yourself of this problem.

1. Open the Start Menu & begin typing "Controlled". Controlled Folder Access should be offered as a result.
2. Open & turn off Controlled Folder Access.

---

--- Other thoughts ---

---

Do you still have these seemingly identically named files in the Desktop folder?:

04/14/2021 07:47 PM 290,082 all labs to march 2021.pdf
04/14/2021 06:00 PM 297,980 all labs to march 2021.pdf

If so, could you open PowerShell to the folder location and Copy & paste the following commands one-at-a-time and copy hte results to your reply:

( Move other PDFs out of the folder )

• gci *.pdf
  
  • The above should list both files. Curious if Mode (Attrubutes) are the same on both files.

If the above command returns both files, please continue with the folloiwing. If only one or none are returned, please post back with detail.

• gci *.pdf | %{ ( [UInt16[]][Char[]]$_.Name ).ForEach({ '{0:x4}' -f $_ }) -join '|' }
  
  • Checking for non-printing characters and non-stndard spaces
  
  
• If you want to try another deletion method that might work with non-standard characters, try:
  
  • gci *.pdf | Remove-Item -LiteralPath { $_.FullName }

---

Final Thought

---

A brute-force method that might work would be to:

1. From the Location tab in its Properties dialog, Re-direct the Desktop folder under This PC to a newly-created folder (of any name) in the same folder as the original Desktop folder. But when prompted, don't move the files. Once you do this, you'll have two folders both displaying the name Desktop. The original, with the files from your Desktop, will no longer have the Location tab in its Properties.
2. Copy all files except the problematic ones from the old folder to the new one.
3. In the old folder with the problem files, Shift + Rt-Click in the folder background & select Open PowerShell window here
4. Copy & paste these two commands into the window & press Enter.

ri desktop.ini -force
(gi .).Attributes -= 'ReadOnly'

1. If there are no errors, type sl .. to move up one level.
2. TYpe gci -ad to list folders. You should see hte Desktop folder we just left and your newly-created folder displaying its true name.
3. Now, you can try to delete the old Desktop folder with the bad files inside it with this command:

ri Desktop -Recurse -Force


Good Luck!!!

I am not sure how to open the PowerShell to the folder location and the files are not in a folder they are on my desktop. I can move the one file to a folder but I cannot move the other one. This whole thing is really strange and I am not that computer literate. All I know is from reading and from some things that I have learned here when I have had an issue.

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I forgot to reply to the suggestion to try the information found at [Fix] “Could not find this item” When Deleting a File or Folder in Windows - Winhelponline

When I tried that it deleted the one file but not the other and there are 2 files of the same name on the desktop. The strange thing is that I can take the file that is where it should be and move it to the desktop and then open either one again or delete either one, but I cannot delete both or open the one that is left on my desktop after deleting the other one.

You could try using 7-zip to compress the file. Right click and select 'add to archive' and then tick the box for 'delete files after compression'. Leave the rest on default. You can then delete the remaining folder on the desktop. I'm only suggesting 7-zip as that's the app I use for compressing.



7-Zip

lnjr said:

I was able to boot from the usb with no problem. However, after getting to the command prompt being open and typing notepad a notepad appears and I typed in
-select Open
-set Files of type to All files
-click on This PC

but there is no screen like you have shown - I just have the notepad with the information I typed

I wasn't telling you to type that in. I was telling you to do it - in order to get to the Open file dialog [just as you managed to find your way to the Save file dialog].
- You could use the Save file dialog instead but I think the Open file dialog is less likely to lead to mistakes and accidental file overwrites.

Denis

lnjr said:

Thanks, I will give that a try. I actually use 7zip as well


I have been looking for information on how to get to that screen that Denis (Try3) suggested regarding booting from an InstallUSB then use its command prompt to browse to your Desktop & delete that file - I can get the computer running booting from the InstallUSB that I made using the windows media creation tool and selecting the command prompt since I must be missing something. Maybe I should not have made the installUSB by using the windows media creation tool to download and install windows 10 to the usb.

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I think that compressing the file as suggested using 7zip worked! I then deleted the compressed file. Going to restart the computer now and see if those pesky files appear again. Thanks and will let you know if that solved my problem

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I have restarted the computer twice and so far that file is not showing back up. Fingers crossed that when I check later on today or tomorrow morning it has not appeared again :) I highlighted both of those files and compressed them as suggested and when it was done the files were gone and the only thing there was the compressed file. I had deleted the file, but am going to restore it to the desktop and move it to another folder the my documents folder for now - just in case - LOL.

Thanks So Very Much!

(still going to try and figure out what I was doing wrong with the steps that Try3 gave me since who knows if I will need to access that environment in the future and it might be helpful to know exactly how to use it.

Glad it's sorted 👍