I do a full backup to tape every night, and every morning the log has this line in it (filename broken manually so as not to screw up table width—in the log it’s all one “word”):
I’ve tried doing wildcard searches on sections of the name to try to find it (no dice, and what is with that “directory” name at the beginning?). Tried Googling it—nothing.
I see a bunch of “mlb” in there and a couple of "video"s and references to “rm” and “mediaplayer”—Major League Baseball? I suppose I might have downloaded a clip from a news story and this is some leftover artifact of that. It doesn’t seem to be doing any harm, whatever it is, but being the anal person that I am, I’d like to not see it in my error log anymore.
Make sure you are searching hidden files and directories, also.
I’m not much of a windows person, but the problem might be that when you search, the results can’t display the name of the file because it is too long for the search tool as well.
Open a command prompt. Use “cd” to change directories, “dir” to list them and google to find the other useful DOS commands.
What’s not visible in the Windows graphical environment is usually visible in the command line environment. The name will probably be truncated, though, so look for something within the first eight characters.
Someone please correct me if I’m wrong, but it looks like the name of the folder the file is in has been truncated already. Your looking for a folder right under C (C:~~L~P~N~~0001). Either there is a folder with a funky name, or you’re looking for a directory with an L a P and an N in the name.
Slightly off topic, but a full tape backup every night?. You’re rare. Very rare.
Not sure if the syntax is correct, but something like this might work.
Open a command tool. (Start Menu > Accessories > Something)
At the prompt, change to the C directory:
*cd C:*
Then, list all files in the C directory and separate out all the lines that include rbn.com. The “more” command displays one screen of output at a time, pausing until you tell it to show you more so it doesn’t all scroll by:
I do a full backup weekly and incremental backups nightly. The idea I meant to convey is that I back up EVERYTHING rather than selecting specific folders, so I have no idea where this file might be.
We’re on our way out the door soon, so I will give these suggestions a try later this weekend and report back. Thanks much for chiming in!
My philosophy is: the more obscure, funky, tortured and hidden a filename is, the less you want it inhabiting your computer.
That log entry might not be a true file name, or it may be a file plus some parameters or it may be an abbreviated name plus other stuff. A glance at the tape backup manual might suggest how to interpret the log string. It looks more like a URL or http code.
If it truly is a file located on C:, you should be able to drill down thru the folders to find it, starting at the root. Be sure you are not overlooking system and hidden files. There should be an entry at the C: root that matches the first part of the string at least, altho I’m unsure if the tildes (~) represent a single tilde character or they are wildcard substitutes for multiple missing characters.
And can we assume you have scanned your drive with the usual tools – anti-virus and malware detectors like AdAware or Spybot? Wouldn’t hurt. Also check your startup group for odd programs.
I just realized I might have sounded snarky. I didn’t mean to. I wasn’t calling you out for exageration. I was just shocked to run into someone who actually does back up their computer on a truly periodic basis.