I have a VB5 application (ftpclien.exe) which creates a flag file
(ftpclien_online.txt) when it is running, and then deletes that flag file
when it is finished.

I then have another VB5 program (mvmctrl.exe) which looks for that flag file
with the following code:

If Dir(DirToDo + "FTPClien_ONLINE.TXT") <> "" Then
   LogDebug "Didn't do CreateArray - FTPClien_ONLINE.TXT exists", "High"
   BadFTPClient = BadFTPClient + 1 ' increment counter - may have a problem!
   Exit Sub
Else
   BadFTPClient = 0 '   reset it.
   txtStatus.BackColor = vbWhite
End If

As you can see, it doesn't even open the flag file - just tests whether it
exists or not.If it exists, mvmctrl.exe does nothing for this cycle and waits
30 seconds for the next cycle.

On 1 machine I have intermittent problems where for some reason the
mvmctrl.exe application locks the file, so when the ftpclien.exe application
tries to delete it, it can't - gets an error 70 sharing violation. And then
of course the mvmctrl.exe application on it's next cycle thinks that
ftpclien.exe is still running, so it refuses to do any processing.

Previously I could quit mvmctrl.exe & ftpclien.exe would then be able to
delete the flag file at the end of it's run, then restart mvmctrl.exe & all
would be ok for another day or 2.

Then I started looking into it further & found 2 utility applications -
unlocker.exe and wholockme.exe, which both confirm that the flag file can't
be removed because it is locked by mvmctrl.exe & these 2 utilities will even
allow me to unlock the file without having to stop my mvmctrl.exe
application.

However, I want to solve the problem rather than work around it. Can anyone
tell me why the simple act of doing a dir() on a file would lock it so that
other applications can't delete it? And any way to stop it doing so?

One other point - I am using Windows 2000, and a few newsgroup threads have
hinted that this might actually be a win2k problem, and certainly I haven't
noticed it on my other Win XP machine.

It must be possible to release the lock under program control though, as both
unlocker.exe & wholockme.exe manage to do it cleanly.

Thanks,

Dave

Show quote Hide quote Instead of using the Dir function to check existance, use something like
below (air code).  It's possible that Dir is putting some kind of lock on
the file. Besides that, using Dir to check for a file's existance can cause
problems with other uses of Dir.

Public Function FileExists(ByVal FileName As String) As Boolean

    On Error GoTo EH

    If (GetAttr(FileName) And vbDirectory) <> vbDirectory Then
        FileExists = True
    End If

    Exit Function

EH:

    FileExists = False

End Function


Oh.....and NEVER use + for string concatenation.  Use the & operator.

<snip>

Or  :-

Public Function FileExists(ByVal FileName As String) As Boolean

    On Error Resume Next

     If (GetAttr(FileName) And vbDirectory) <> vbDirectory Then
        If Err = 0 Then
           FileExists = True
        End If
    End If

End Function

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