Jim’s Random Notes

Windows Vista (and Windows Server 2008) have formalized the idea of a “public” directory–a directory on your computer where you can share files with other users. In previous versions, you had to create a folder yourself (often called “Public”) and share it. Vista has a special folder called “Public”, and subfolders named “Public Documents,” “Public Downloads,” “Public Music,” etc. If you enable public folder sharing, then files in those directories are accessible by anybody who can locate your computer on the network.

It can be a bit confusing, though. Here’s a screen shot of Windows Explorer showing the Public folder on my machine:

Looking at that, you’d expect the UNC path to my “Public Downloads” directory to be “\\JIMM\Public\Public Downloads”. But if you try it, you’ll quickly find that the path does not exist. Where, then, is it?

If you click in the address bar of Windows Explorer (image below), you’ll see that the local path to my “Public Downloads” directory is “C:\Users\Public\Downloads”.

Since the main Public directory is \\JIMM\Public (although you won’t see C:\Users\Public if you select the Public directory and then click in the address bar), then it follows that the Downloads directory would be \\JIMM\Public\Downloads. And that’s what it is.

it’s kind of confusing that the real directory name is something different from what’s shown in Windows Explorer. But I’m happy that the names don’t have embedded spaces. Filenames with embedded spaces make working with command line tools difficult.

Today I was trying to copy files in Windows Explorer and ran into a rather nasty little bug. Explorer wouldn’t let me select multiple files. I couldn’t Shift+Click to select a range or Ctrl+Click to select individual files. Keyboard shortcuts didn’t work, and the Edit | Select All menu option was disabled.

This appears to be a bug in Windows Explorer, although I’ve seen conflicting information. Microsoft’s knowledge base article about the problem says, “This problem occurs because certain applications add a key to the registry. The key prevents you from selecting multiple items in Windows Explorer.” Their recommended solution is to reset the view. That didn’t work for me.

The solution I found requires editing the registry. You have to start RegEdit and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell, and delete the BagMRU and Bags registry keys. Before you do that, you should close all Windows Explorer windows. If you’re uncomfortable fiddling with the registry, it’s probably a good idea to set a system restore point before you start.

I don’t have the time (or the inclination, truth to be told) to dig in and figure out what Bags and BagMRU do. It seems odd, though, that “certain applications” would be able to cause this behavior, unless they were malicious–deliberately trying to cause grief. Is this a bug in the Vista version of Windows Explorer?