Unable to open files or folders from the Filr desktop client on Windows

  • Document ID:7024712
  • Creation Date:02-Jul-2020
  • Modified Date:26-Aug-2020
    • Micro Focus Products:
      Filr

Environment

Filr 3
Filr 4

Situation

When attempting to open some files or folders from the Filr Windows desktop application, the file/folder does not open and the user sees an error:

"A device attached to the system is not functioning"

The same files can be opened using the Filr web client.

Resolution

There are two workarounds for this issue.

Workaround 1. Delete the Filr client FilrMetaData.db.
This file is typically located in C:\users\<user>\AppData\local\novell\filr\<user>

Follow these steps:
  • Stop the Filr client (right-click on the icon in the notification area, while holding shift, then choose Exit).
  • Stop the "Novell Filr Caching Service" (Filr Service) using the Windows Task Manager.
  • Optionally, create a backup of the "Filr Storage" (by default %LOCALAPPDATA%\FilrStorage\MyFiles), in case there are changes to offline files which have not yet been synchronized.
  • Remove or rename the %LOCALAPPDATA%\Novell\Filr\[user]\FilrMetaData.db
  • Reboot the workstation.
After the reboot, the Filr client may take longer to restart, as it must rebuild the synchronization database.

After restarting the Filr application, you may see an error such as "Location not available.  C:\Users\<user>\Filr is not accessible.  The handle is invalid." If so, close and re-launch the application.

OR

Workaround 2. Remove and re-install the Filr client application.

NOTE: For the Filr client version 4.2.1 and later, a feature was introduced which will not delete the entire FilrMetaData.db file, but will delete the metadata table which provides items for the directory listing. Implementing this feature may resolve problems similar to what is listed in this TID, but this has not been tested.  The steps to invoke this new feature are:

1. Log out from Filr desktop client.
2. Close all open Explorer windows.
3. Open registry editor. Navigate to: "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Novell\Filr"
4. Check if "Delete File Metadata" is set to 1. If not, set it to 1.
5. Login back into the Filr desktop client.

After the login, the metadata table will be deleted and the Delete File Metadata value will be reset to 0.

Cause

Corrupt Filr metadata.

Additional Information

See also TID 7024781 "Filr Desktop Client shows duplicate folder names"