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I've got a Visual Studio 2010 project with some post-build commands to neatly package up all the dlls etc that the project needs, zip them all, and then copy the zip to a network drive for distribution. (Aside: I am aware of the various "correct" ways of distributing applications with Visual Studio but due to the weird / esoteric nature of my application they are not appropriate)

I moved to another computer, extracted, and ran, and found that it was missing a dll. I went to look at my build output in VS2010, and found this line: The system cannot find the file specified. C:\My Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\SolutionName\ProjectName\File.dll

Confusing, as I can see that the file is right there in Windows Explorer. I decided to try manually copying the file from the command line, and I got the same error message. The file also does not show up when I use "dir", even though I can see the file plainly in Windows Explorer. Even MORE strangely, when I tried to copy the file, it was suggested by tab completion!

No clue what is going on here. Any ideas?

edit: After following up on an answer, I discovered another odd thing about this file: the "Hidden" check box under the file's properties is grayed out. Why would this be?

second edit: Well, I uploaded the file to the internet then downloaded it again and that fixed the problem. Still very confused as to why this even happened in the first place.

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What happens when you do dir /a:sh in the directory? – Breakthrough Aug 22 '11 at 21:47
C:\My Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\SolutionName\ProjectName>dir /a:sh Volume in drive C has no label. Volume Serial Number is 24A7-5D52 Directory of C:\My Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\SolutionName\ProjectName File Not Found – Alexander Questioning Bresee Aug 22 '11 at 21:50
Is it possible that this is some kind of symlink that explorer supports but cmd.exe does not? – Fopedush Aug 22 '11 at 22:45
I don't think so. I copied the file there myself. I didn't make any kind of symlink. – Alexander Questioning Bresee Aug 23 '11 at 13:11

1 Answer

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Couple thoughts:

  • The file is marked as hidden, but you have 'show hidden files' turned on in Explorer.
  • You have disk corruption (try a chkdsk).
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the file is not hidden (doesn't appear 'faded out' in Explorer, and under 'Properties' the 'Hidden' box is unchecked [in fact it is grayed out]). As for disk corruption -- I not an hour ago ran chkdsk for an unrelated issue and it came up clean. – Alexander Questioning Bresee Aug 22 '11 at 21:52
Why would the "Hidden" box be grayed out??? – Alexander Questioning Bresee Aug 22 '11 at 21:53

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