Invalid File Handle - Movie Downloads Beware!

Invalid File Handle - Movie Downloads Beware!

By Strictly-Software

Recently I downloaded a film, Con Man (2018), however when I try to do anything with the file such as open, run, copy, move or delete it I get a Windows "Invalid File Handle" error message.

I did some research and found that on certain file systems such as NTFS, CDFS, exFAT, UDFS, FAT, and FAT32, there are some reserved file names that you should never use which causes this error. One of these is con. Others include: PRN, AUX, NUL, COM1, COM2, COM3, COM4, COM5, COM6, COM7, COM8, COM9, LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, LPT4, LPT5, LPT6, LPT7, LPT8, and LPT9.

I checked the filename of the movie and the person had only named it Con.Man.2018.1080p.mp4, meaning that Windows saw the filename as Con preventing me doing anything with this file.

At the moment it is permanently stuck on my file system as I cannot remove the files containing folder either.

I did have a copy of this file on a USB stick however which I could remove, obviously due to the different format of the USB disk drive. If I had used uTorrent to download the file directly to the USB drive instead of first to a folder on my Windows drive I wouldn't have had this issue.

I am basically looking for ways to remove this file as I cannot rename it to something else, either from Windows or the Command Prompt, to enable deletion.

I saw someone suggest renaming the file to \\.\Con.xxx but this does not work as I cannot get a file handle to rename it in the first place.

Therefore this is more of a warning write up than a "How To Guide", although you can be sure I will update this when I find a solution.

So if you are downloading files such as movies to your computer be careful and check the filename first and if you are using a tool such as a Torrent downloader ensure the downloaded file name is changed to something an NTFS or FAT type disk can handle, or download it straight to a USB drive with a different disk format which will allow file deletion.

For more information you can read this MSDN article, called "Naming Files, Paths, and Namespaces".

It states: Do not use the following reserved names for the name of a file: CON, PRN, AUX, NUL, COM1, COM2, COM3, COM4, COM5, COM6, COM7, COM8, COM9, LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, LPT4, LPT5, LPT6, LPT7, LPT8, and LPT9. Also avoid these names followed immediately by an extension; for example, NUL.txt is not recommended.

I will update this when I get a solution.

Premium Plugins Cut Half In Price!

Premium Plugins Cut Half In Price!

By Strictly-Software

Just to let you know the Premium Plugins for Wordpress, Strictly AutoTags and Strictly TweetBOT have been cut in price, by HALF!

These two plugins which can be used in conjunction with each other to fully automate a site are now only £20 each and can be purchased from my main sites secure payment page.

With both of these plugins together (both for PHP 5 and 7), feed content can be automatically loaded with a feed loading plugin before tags automatically being added to the articles with Strictly AutoTags.

Then you can Tweet out to one or more accounts different Tweets, with different content, shortened or not, with a time delay to stop Twitter Rushes with Strictly TweetBOT.

The premium plugins have many more features than the free versions and since Wordpress has taken them off their site, despite over half a million downloads, you can only get them from my site.

Try the free versions first if you want, however the options in the premium versions are there for performance, extra functionality and speed.

HALF PRICE PLUGINS TO AUTOMATE YOUR WORDPRESS SITE!

What more can you want if you work with Wordpress and feeds to give yourself good SEO, tagging and social media presence automatically?

Link your Twitter account up with a Facebook page and you can post from your site to Twitter to Facebook all whilst you work or relax.

Safely knowing you will grow your site with new tags, limit the number of deeplinking to prevent single new tags creating pages, and get your tags turned into Twitter #hashtags!

What more can you want?

Check out my Facebook page for more info!