Ever run into any of the following messages when you try and delete or move a file in windows?

• Cannot Delete Folder: It is being used by another person or program.
• Cannot delete file: Access is denied
• There has been a sharing violation.
• The source or destination file may be in use.
• The file is in use by another program or user.
• Make sure the disk is not full or write-protected and that the file is not currently in use.

I run into these quite a lot, most frequently with media files, .avi especially. I’ve linked before to a utility to deal with this but in its case you frequently need to restart to effect the ‘unlocking’ of the file. I’ve also encountered a batch file you can use on windows to deal with this, but it’s clunky. Enter Unlocker, a donationware Windows utility to address this problem. When you encounter a spuriously locked file, folder, whatever, right click, unlock it, and banish it from the system.

Now if someone would only release a utility to help manage Windows’ retarded usb device management (you can’t eject that device, it’s in use, Windows claims, even though it is not. Ugh. I get closer and closer to moving back to a Mac, I tell you, but for the damned games).

Anyway, check it out, and kudos to the developer for a simple and effective solution to the problem. One wonders why he can figure this out while Microsoft can’t seem to.