[Box Backup] NTFS junction/reparse point

[Chris Wilson]

Hi Roy,

On Tue, 24 Jan 2012, Roy wrote:
>> 
>>> When I use the command prompt, I don't see the Mijn Video's or My Videos 
>>> folder. Not as an administrator, or with my own account. So how can BB see 
>>> it? I hope that I don't have to exclude folders that I cannot see ;-) 
>>> There are also no *.lnk files present in the documents folder that could 
>>> point to another place. Can I log something more that I can 'see' those 
>>> folders?
>> 
>> You can try downloading Junction:
>> 
>> http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896768
>> 
>> and run "junction -s c:\users\<username>" to list all junctions under that 
>> directory. Hopefully that will show you what's happening.
>
> Thanks for that utility. That showed the junctions, and it could also 
> delete them. Hopefully no problems any more with the backup.

In fact I just discovered that you can even see them with "dir /ah" from 
the command prompt. Neither the command prompt nor Windows Explorer will 
allow you to enter the junction point as if it was a directory. I think 
this is a deliberate bit of trickery by Microsoft, with very confusing 
error messages (Access Denied in explorer, File Not Found in cmd.exe).

I don't recommend that you remove them, as some software may be depending 
on them, and they're not easy to recreate. Just exclude them from the 
backup. I'm thinking more seriously about backing them up and restoring 
them now, as Charles once suggested. It seems that they're very widespread 
(littered) on Windows 7.

Cheers, Chris.
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