Strange Message When Starting Win 2K

[kraye]

Whenever i reboot my W2K workstation machine, i get this dialog box (attached) with the title: "File Name Warning". It says, "You have a file or folder on your computer called 'C:\program' which could cause certain applications to not function correctly. Renaming it to 'C:\program1' would solve this problem. Would you like to rename it now?"

Well, with all hidden folders visible, there's no such folder on the drive AND the whole deal seems quite strange to me. Somehow, i just can't believe that MS would arbitrarily suggest a new name for a folder in a dialog. My experience is that they might suggest an action, but usually won't specify anything so exact as a name. Maybe i'm wrong, but i don't want to click on this thing until i'm convinved its for real. I'm hoping someone might have some insight into this.

Kat

[MerlinTheWizard]

Are you sure there isn't any *file* (or folder) at C:\ (maybe an hidden file) named "Program"?

As far as I know, you'll get this warning as well if the file or folder is named Program.xxx. That is, Windows doesn't care about the extension when checking for this.

It appears like this is a legal Windows warning (from what I've read), but I wouldn't let it do anything (just Ignore) until you find the "offending" file and decide what to do with it yourself.

I guess Windows checks for this because of the standard "Program Files" folder. Because of the white space in it, some ill-written programs may fail if there is another file the name of which (without the extension) is "Program". It's very unlikely that it would cause a problem, though. Yet another Microsoft's "id***-friendly" feature... which causes more trouble than it helps.

[magicfly]

are you sure your pc isn't infected with any trojans or something like that?

i never saw a message like that on win2000

[MerlinTheWizard]

are you sure your pc isn't infected with any trojans or something like that?

i never saw a message like that on win2000 

I was skeptical as well, but I looked for it on the Web and found messages from Microsoft certified people saying it was a legal message, so I thought: it must be legal.

Then I tried this to confirm:

* Create a file named Program.txt in C:\ ( you can call it Program.[anything you want] )

* Close the current session

* Open a new session

You'll get this message. It IS a valid Windows message, and if you choose "Rename", it will rename the file to Program1.txt without modifying it.

Hence, what I said in my earlier message was true.

[Shotgun]

I've gotten this message from time to time at my work on different PCs.

I click "Fix" once and never comes back.

Never found who the culprit was... If you do please let us know what the **** it is.

[sarters]

The culprit is probably an old program that was written with some code that is pre-long file name so instead of adding the software to program files, it simply created a new directory C:/program. I've just done that a few days ago and was concerned about the message too, until i read the previous posts and put it al together.

[Micky-007]

Hi

I have just had this msg for the 1st time as well, but on WinXp Pro .. found the file and deleted it, I then rebooted pc and my DU Meter program i use came up saying serial had ended. so dont know if that had anything to do with it or not. Rentered Serial and Du Meter is fine and the file "program" has yet to re show it self (yet) . So dont know if Du Meter had anything to do with this or not as cant find any help on net from it. Also done full virus check and trojan check and nothing.

Micky

[Spyder2k]

It's probably to support programs that may still use short file names.

A file by the name of "Program" would take the short file name of "progra~1" from the "Program Files" folder.

[MadGutts]

I havent seen this, and it seems very odd..

All files in any MS OS are restricted to the 8.3 format - long name or not.

But any file named "program.xxx" would be a legit name - it only has 7 chars. So why your version is asking for t to be renamed doesn't make sense unless it is being run from another program. - i.e. left over from an installer.

Double check the root for anything called "program*" - make sure you have hidden files and folders shown and also check with a command prompt. If there is no file, create one ! see what happens...

Hope this Helps...

[MastaVR6]

I ran into a similar issue installing Altiris clients on our network. Apparently this problem stems from bad installer code, that installs an .EXE to :

"C:\program files\myapp\app.exe"

Sadly, the installer is moronic/anal and reads this as "C:\program", renaming the original .EXE to program.exe (ading the .exe extention) and instlling it to C:\.

Unfortunately, the uninstallers created by the setup aren't very reliable in removing this atrocity from your system- especially if you realize your problem and run the offending installers using SFN instead of LFN.

There are way too many "C:\program" entries in the registry to root out the most vile versions of this issue. A dummy program that does absolutely nothing is a good workaround.