path length error processing

Advanced Renamer forum
#1 : 14/07-20 12:22
James E. McBride
James E. McBride
Posts: 12
I am trying to process a batch of filenames that are longer than the maximum path length allowed by Windows (256 chars, I think??) to shorten the length of the filename. Problem is, when I try to import them into ARen, they error out, presumably because of the path length.
Is there a change that can be made either in ARen or in Windows that could get around that problem?

Thanks for the help!
--Jim


14/07-20 12:22
#2 : 14/07-20 14:25
James E. McBride
James E. McBride
Posts: 12
OK, I did find the following, which was an update to Windows in the Anniversary update:
https://www.howtogeek.com/266621/how-to-make-win dows-10-accept-file-paths-over-260-chara cters/

It is a registry edit to make Windows ignore the 260 character limit on path length.

That being said, is there a hard limit somewhere in the coding of ARen that still takes into account the limit in Windows?

It is interesting how and when I get errors when processing my list of files.

--If I select all of the files themselves and drag and drop them to ARen, they never get added to the list at all
-- If I select the immediate containing folder and drag/drop it to ARen, the files are added to the list. When I process that list to remove a string from the beginning of every filename (to attempt to bring it under the Windows path length limit), I get an error for each file of: Error Code: 101 ; Description: Unknown Error. The System cannot find the path specified

Does that mean that the error is happening before the filenames even hit ARen? Or, is there a way that ARen can be made to see the files?

Since ARen would be an excellent way to make the filenames compliant with the pathname restriction in Windows, it would be great if ARen could at least SEE the files that need processing so that they can be processed.

Thanks in advance for your attention and help!

--Jim


14/07-20 14:25