Summary: There are lots of reasons you might not be able to open a file. In this article we look at programs that refuse to open files marked "read-only", and what to do.
I saved a copy of important excel files back in 2004. When I tried to open what I was looking for, I was unsuccessful. A window popped up and said "xyz.xls file cannot be accessed. The file may be read-only (which it shows in properties) or you may be trying to access a read-only location, or the server the doc is stored on may not be responding". I know it's possible to take ownership of a hard drive in order to change read-only status, however I forgot how, plus I don't know if its possible to do it with a CD. Can you help?
Besides accessing files that may have been written to CD as a backup, this is a common trap people fall into when moving files from machine to machine.
There are many programs that will refuse to open files that are marked read-only. The problem is that files can appear as "read-only" for several different reasons.
I'll look at those reasons, as well as the most common scenario where people run into this problem. And of course I'll outline what you can do.
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Files can appear read-only for one several reasons, the most common being:
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The file is marked read-only. Individual files can be marked as being read-only - typically as a means to protect them from being overwritten.
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The file is on a media that is read-only. CD-R's are write-once media. Once a CD-R has been burned, it cannot be written to - it can only be read. Hence the files on it are marked as "read-only".
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The file is in use. Less frequently, another program might have the file open in such a way that anyone can read it, but the file is locked for writing. In some cases this can be reported as the file being "read-only".
Let's look at what we can do about each of those.
If a file is marked as read-only on the disk, it's fairly easy to reset that attribute.
Fire up Windows Explorer, and locate the file in question. Here I've located "c:\documents and settings\leon\my documents\safeontheinternet.pdf":
Now, right click on the file you want to change, and click on Properties. You should see a dialog much like this one:
Note the Attribute setting "Read Only" - uncheck it if it's checked, and press OK. If no error appears, the setting has been removed.
If the file is on a read-only media like a CD-R or a read-only network share, you cannot change the read-only status. In this situation, or if you just want to avoid changing the read-only status of the file as we just did, the next best solution is to make a copy of the file onto your local hard disk.
So, using Windows Explorer, the command prompt, or whatever means you use to copy files, copy the file or files from the read-only media to a folder on your hard disk.
Important! When you copy a file from a read-only media such as a CD-R, the read-only status is copied with it. That means you still can't write to the file until you take the steps above to reset the read-only attribute on the file on your hard disk.
This causes people no end of confusion.
Finally, if the file is in use, you again, can either make a copy of it, or determine who's using the file and close that program.
While the question asks specifically about Excel, in fact the most common scenario where this whole read-only problem comes up is when email folders are copied to CD-R for backup or for moving to a different machine.
Mail programs, particularly Outlook and Outlook Express, expect - and require - that they be able to write to the files containing email. If these files are marked read-only then the program will either fail to open them, or worse, tell you that they don't exist.
And remember - copying the files to your local hard disk isn't enough. I see people frequently stymied because they've copied their files locally thinking that was enough, and they still can't open their mail.
After copying files from CD-R you still must reset the read-only attribute if you want to be able to write to them.
And naturally that holds true for the Excel file we started with. Copy the file to your hard disk, reset the read-only attribute, and you should be good to go.
Related:
Article C2781 - September 6, 2006
Problem as:"'local travelling.xls' cannot be accessed. The file may be read-only, or you may be trying to access a read-only location. Or, the server the document is stored on may not be responding." I'd tried your method, but problem still. i have no idea. Could you help me to look if i send it to you? Many thks in advance.
Posted by: Linc at January 12, 2009 5:37 PMHave downloade a file tom tom 2.5 And can't open it any ideas TomTomHOME2winlatest description WinLatest.exe hope you can help
Posted by: Amanda at January 13, 2009 11:47 PMI followed your instructions for moving OE6 to a new machine. I copied the OE6 to my Documents on the new machine and unchecked the read only but every time I close the wizard the folder reverts to read only. ???
Posted by: Dale Siefker at January 29, 2009 2:55 PMHi,
I think I have the same problem as above, but not quite. I made backup CDs of my computer 5yrs ago. I can see all the files with corresponding creation dates and size on the CDs, they have the read only checked, but I can't open or copy/extract any of them from the CDs. Do you have any advice. I've been wondering what to do for years now. Thanks for your time!
08-Feb-2009
I want to move just mail folders from one PC to another both are using Outlook express 6. I have copied files across and tried to import them but no luck (attribute read only is off). When pointing to the folder to import a mess comes back "no messages can be found ..." I set some of the DBX file to associate with Outlook Express but still no luck - any hints ? Thanks
Posted by: Phil at March 11, 2009 5:15 PMI have exactly the same problem as Phil on March 11, 2009, i.e. transfer of mail folders Outlook express ^. Are files read only in express, as I cannot seem to change the properties to enable them to be exported?!
thanks
Posted by: roger at June 29, 2009 5:18 AMI am running the java window to extract bookmarked pages from a PDF file. This works perfectly on my system, but on my client's network I get the following message:
Posted by: Michael McGrath at July 9, 2009 4:01 AMRaiseError: The file may be read-only, or another user may have it open. Please save the document with a different name or in a different folder.
Doc.extractPages:7:Console undefined:Exec
===> The file may be read-only, or another user may have it open. Please save the document with a different name or in a different folder.
I have saved it as another name and checked the read-only, but still get the message. Any clues would be helpful.
Thanks,
Michael
Wow, Leo! You saved me hours upon hours of work! Thanks for this article!
Posted by: Christi Herrick at September 13, 2009 2:14 PMALL THE COMMENTS AND THE SOLUTION ARE GOOD, BUT SOMETIMES IF IT DOESNT WORK EITHER. THERE CAN BE PROBLEM OF OFFICE AND ALSO DESTINATION OF THAT FILE. TRY JUST TO DRAG THE FILE YOU WANT TO OPEN FROM CD ON DESKTOP AND OPEN. IT WORKS :)
Posted by: AMIT at September 18, 2009 3:48 AMHi, I've been having a problem with this CD of mine. I read your article and tried to do what you said. For example
I went into the file which is a .rar file. I tried to uncheck the read only status and when I applied it came up with 'access denied' I tried to copy the contents into the cd but it comes up with 'incorrect parameter'I tried to fix that problem, but there were no solutions.
This CD is from a friend of mine and the majority of the file types are set in .rar. It doesn't let me open it or copy it. Please help.
09-Oct-2009
Posted by: Andrew at October 8, 2009 10:07 PM