"Select recursively within a given folder" doesn't seem to work

[MartinPC]

Reference:

• AllDup 4.4.10

• Windows 7 x64 SP1 Pro, updated with almost all updates up to ca. September 2016, updated with security-only updates since then (December 2019 Patch Tuesday security-only updates not yet applied)

• Kaspersky Antivirus Free 20.0.14.1085, current except for today's minor application update (not yet automatically applied)

• Everything 1.4.1.935 search utility set to update its index in background

Problem:

I ran a duplicate file search that generated the following log:

================================================================
2019-12-16 09:46:11 AM - INFO: Unable to detect the VLC Media Player 32-bit version 3 on your system
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - --------------------------------------------------
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - AllDup 4.4.10
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - Search Method: File name + File extension + File size
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 1.Source folder: C:\Users\[MyName]\Documents
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - Option: Compare files from all source folders
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - Folder filter activated: 7
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - Filter type: Exclusive
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 1.folder filter: c:\windows
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 2.folder filter: c:\program files (x86)
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 3.folder filter: c:\program files
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 4.folder filter: ?:\system volume information
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 5.folder filter: ?:\recycled
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 6.folder filter: ?:\recycler
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - 7.folder filter: ?:\$recycle.bin
2019-12-16 09:46:14 AM - Determine file count of all source folders...
2019-12-16 09:46:15 AM - File count: 32,585
2019-12-16 09:46:15 AM - Scan: C:\Users\[MyName]\Documents
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - Found 15,896 duplicates with a total of 3.91 GB inside folder 'C:\Users\[MyName]\Documents'
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - Scanned files: 32,585
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - Groups: 6,312
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - File comparison count: 32,585
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - Duplicates: 15,896 (48%) (3.91 GB)
2019-12-16 09:46:29 AM - Elapsed time: 00:00:15
================================================================

Once that was done, I attempted to select all duplicates within one of the Documents folder's subfolders, 1 From IBM ThinkPad -- i.e., C:\Users\[MyName]\Documents\1 From IBM ThinkPad -- trying both the button function and the menu function. No files were selected.

I then moved the 1 From IBM ThinkPad subfolder up one level, to C:\Users\[MyName]\1 From IBM ThinkPad, selected both the Documents folder and the 1 From IBM ThinkPad folder in AllDup, and ran the search again with the same settings. [Log not supplied in this post.] Once again, I tried to recursively select all files within 1 From IBM ThinkPad and no files were selected.

Questions:

"Select recursively" (and other bulk-selection functions) are critical to me, as I don't have time to manually select thousands and thousands of duplicate files. (This particular search is only one of many that I need to run.)

Have I overlooked some key AllDup setting? Or is AllDup's "Select recursively within a given folder" function not working under at least some circumstances?

Any help the author or other users can provide would be greatly appreciated!

[therube]

I attempted to select all duplicates within one of the Documents folder's subfolders, 1 From IBM ThinkPad -- i.e., C:\Users\[MyName]\Documents\1 From IBM ThinkPad -- trying both the button function and the menu function. No files were selected.

Which particular Select function did you select; All files inside the folder structure of this file, Select files by path, or ... ?

Did a directory tree (or partial) pop up?


Wonder if it might be a permissions issue?
Do you have sufficient permission to access [MyName...]? (I'd think you would.)
Or might it be a (Windows) redirect issue? (I never use "my documents" myself.)

[MartinPC]

Thank you very much for taking the time to get back to me. I appreciate it.

I just figured out what I did wrong: I used the wrong Process Mode ("Groups with some files selected" instead of "All groups"). It was a dumb rookie mistake that came from not reading carefully enough. Now that I've changed the Process Mode to "All groups" I'm able to bulk-select files using the "Select all files recursively in a specific folder" function ... and then bulk-delete them, which comes as a huge relief. (I have a couple of decades of data from multiple computers to deduplicate and consolidate before deciding what I want to keep onboard and what I need to offload.)

But to address your questions and suggestions anyway (even though they are now moot):

• I tried the "Select all files recursively in a specific folder" selection function. I had also tried the "Select files by path" function but didn't mention it in my post.

• My Windows account has Administrator permissions, so access to local files is theoretically not an issue. Moreover, I had run a recursive "take ownership" script targeting every file in my Documents folder, in case there were any lingering permissions problems with files copied over from other computers. In theory, every file in my Documents folder is owned by me.

• I don't use those My Whatever shortcuts and aliases, either. I use the file system's actual folder names (Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos, etc.).

Again, I really appreciate your getting back to me and I apologize for posting before I had exhausted every other possibility. In my defense, AllDup is a moderately sophisticated program and it can take a little time and experience for newbies like me to fully understand all of its settings. Looking on the bright side, maybe the next "dumb rookie" who makes the same mistake I did will find this thread and won't need to post.