BUG: "Empty Recycle Bin" Unavailable After Deletion by SHFileOperation

• Microsoft Win32 Application Programming Interface (API), included with:
  • Microsoft Windows NT 4.0

SYMPTOMS

After an application uses SHFileOperation to delete files (FO_DELETE), which are moved to the Recycle Bin (FOF_ALLOWUNDO), the Empty Recycle Bin menu item (found on the pop-up menu when you right-click the bin and also on the Windows Explorer File menu) will remain unavailable.

CAUSE

The shell maintains information on the current state of the Recycle Bin. Recycle Bin uses this information to determine if there are objects in it and disables the Empty Recycle Bin option if no files are present.

When SHFileOperation is used to send files to the Recycle Bin, this information only gets updated if the SHFileOperation call is being made from within the shell's process.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a bug in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article.

Additional query words:

Keywords : kbAPI kbLib kbNTOS400bug kbShellGrp kbGrpUser kbWin32s
Version : winnt:4.0
Platform : winnt
Issue type : kbbug