Katy -> Visual C++ Stuff -> Delete file after reboot

Delete a file after rebooting the computer

A method of deleting a file the next time you reboot your computer. Naturally, it's different depending on whether you're using Windows NT (easy) or Windows 95 (pain in the neck). 

    // What OS are we using? Use proper deletion method.
    OSVERSIONINFO osi;
    osi.dwOSVersionInfoSize = sizeof(OSVERSIONINFO);
    VERIFY(::GetVersionEx(&osi));
    switch(osi.dwPlatformId)
    {
        case VER_PLATFORM_WIN32_WINDOWS:
        {
            // Build the deletion instructions
            char szAction[128];
            lstrcpy(szAction, "NUL=C:\\FILE\\TO\\DELETE.TXT");
			
            // add the action to [rename] section of the WININIT.INI file
            const int BUFSIZE=32768; // max size + 1, i'm hedging my bets
            char RenameSection[BUFSIZE];
            char szWinInitFile[_MAX_PATH];
            GetWindowsDirectory(szWinInitFile, _MAX_PATH);

Note: the lstrcat in the next line does the wrong thing if the windows directory happens to be a root directory -- you'll get C:\\WININIT.INI instead of C:\WININIT.INI, and the GetPrivateProfileSection won't work. 

            lstrcat(szWinInitFile, "\\WININIT.INI");

The idea to use GetPrivateProfileSection came from a post by 'homer@cqgrd.com', found in http://www.dejanews.com WritePrivateProfileString is no good since you could be deleting multiple files, see KB Q140570 

            int length = GetPrivateProfileSection("Rename", RenameSection, 
                BUFSIZE, szWinInitFile);
            lstrcpy(RenameSection + length, szAction);
	    *(RenameSection + length + lstrlen(szAction) + 1) = '\0'; 
            WritePrivateProfileSection("rename", RenameSection, szWinInitFile);
            break;
	}

	case VER_PLATFORM_WIN32_NT:
        {
            // Call MoveFileEx to delete after reboot
            MoveFileEx("C:\\FILE\\TO\\DELETE.TXT", NULL, 
                MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT);
	    break;
        }
	default:
            // Unknown operating system.
            ASSERT(0);
	} //switch

Other ways to accomplish the same thing can be found in the January 1996 Microsoft Systems Journal in the Win32 Q&A column.

For people with an MSDN CD who are viewing this with Internet Explorer, you should be able to jump to all these references on your CD. (Other browsers will complain about badly formed URLs). If Microsoft was smart enough not to change these bookmarks between MSDN issues, this should work for everyone.

 

 

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This page was last modified on 1998/08/23