Unlocking a .zip file
 

Ok, somehow I've managed to frag a zip file containing a year of server logs.

Anaysis tool was running and crashed. Moved the file to another drive without a problem and decided to unzip it to make life easier for the analysis.

WinZip says it can't open the file because of a sharing problem. Windows reports the file as part of a spanned zip file. It isn't...

It's over 1Gb and I really need the data out of it. Any suggestions?

I've tried:

Restarting the machine
Moving the file back to where it was (won't let me as it says there's a sharing violation)
Running Unlocker to kill any processes that may be affecting it (there aren't any)

Thanks in advance...

SB

Have you tried Winrar? It can also read zip files.

Good suggestion, but...

WinRAR says it has repaired it but does nothing. And when I ntry to open with WinRAR, though it detects as a .zip, I get the "Access denied" message. :confused:

SB

Its like logging onto windows and trying to access someone elses files, it won't let you as the file was on a server with a different OS on a different username. pop it back on that server and try opening it from there, should work!

:thumb:

Nope :(

It's on the same box under the same OS and accessed through the same A(admin) account...

I've tried putting it back where it was and I can't - I get the a#same access denied message.

Keep 'em coming, please :confused:

SB

Important: Save yourself some trouble. If you already know the extension of the file(s) you want to get back, just rename all your CHK files to the desired extension and see what works. The programs here are for when you have way too many CHK files to test or when you have way too many different file extensions you want to recover.

So what is a CHK file? Well, any time a program or Windows crashes, any files that were open are not closed properly. Part of closing is writing all the file location information in all the right places. Without this info, Windows can't find all the parts of the file. When SCANDISK or CHKDISK is run, all the parts are identified as "lost file fragments" and converted (if you want) into CHK files. Face it. Stuff crashes all the time. If you only run SCANDISK once a month, you get a month's worth of old crash junk. If you were working on (and lost) something important just before a crash, you might want to try to recover any data from any CHK files that exist. On the other hand, if you aren't in a state of panic over lost data, just delete any CHK files. A handy tip: Keep your disk defragmented. That way if you ever do lose it all, the lost file fragments will be more likely to be complete files.

Welcome Competition! A nice guy named Martin Kratz wrote a utility to compete with my UnCHK program. Amazingly, he sent me the source code. So... I compiled it and am offering it here for your consideration. Now you have two open-source CHK file recovery programs to choose from!

Both programs need the Visual Basic 5 runtime files, which come pre-installed on Windows 2000 and newer. If you don't have them, you can get them from Microsoft or Ziff-Davis. I'll do a side-by-side comparison:

http://www.ericphelps.com/uncheck/




Hope all that helps abit! Theres nothing else I could suggest!

That's cool - thanks for trying anyway. I'll give it a crack in the morning and come back to you...

SB