Answer "No to All" When Copying Files
If you've ever copied a folder's worth of files in Windows, you've come across the Confirm File Replace dialog, which asks you if you want to replace an existing file with a new file. You have the option to answer Yes just for this file, Yes to All—which will just replace all the originals with the new copies—or you can say No; what's missing is a button to say No to All. Rather than clicking No countless times if No to All is what you really want, tech weblog Online Tech Tips points out that Windows simulates the No to All response if you hold the Shift key and then click No. It's a strange feature, and actually one that we covered years ago, but it's worth a second mention. Vista changed this dialog entirely, but if you're still living la vida XP, it's a good shortcut to know.
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OH...MY...GOD!
Microsoft, I want all those hours of my life back. I've always wondered why that button wasn't there. and you never told me it was this easy!!!
Mrrix32
where has this been all my life?
*smacks head in disbelief*
classicalmusicbroadcast
@adam33777: I completely agree
MadModderX
@Adam Pash...
Right the fuck on.
No other way to say it. I found myself asking why there was no such button, just last weekend. I admit I clicked yes to all just cuz I was tired of click NO.
adam33777
For large transfers & backups I tend to go for a 3rd party solution. I personally prefer [burstcopy.com] myself but I've tried Terracopy which I found a nice free alternative. ViceVersa Pro [www.tgrmn.com] is also a fantastic bit of software definitely worth checking out the 30 day trial!
2kreative
Of course, for the DOS renegades (and Windows users who don't mind command prompts), there's RoboCopy -- a great command line tool that lets you do all of the above, including monitoring a directory for changes. Do a search (read: Google it) for RoboCopy and read the white paper -- let your minds be opened and your directories filled with useful data.
P.S. There's a GUI for RoboCopy out there floating about -- don't waste your time with it. It's not all that well written, missing several of the more important features and fails as often as it succeeds. The CL version works a treat. :-)
joefox97
@sebf: Pressing cancel cancels the entire operation. If you have more files left that you need to copy when you hit the file that prompts you and hit cancel, you won't get to copy the rest of those files.
razordu30
Whats the difference between clicking Cancel as a posed to having a No to All button? Surely pressing press Yes to overwriting a few will files will have overwritten them, pressing Cancel will ignore any other files that where queued for copying/moving.
sebf
Fantastic. I can't tell you how many times I've wanted to do this, and never knew about this tip. Thanks a bunch.
Neal Dench
Best option - Install TeraCopy.
That way a "Yes" on a folder wont overwrite all files within that folder
Vivek
Another great Microsoft failure nullified. Thanks!
jfty.009260
Very cool. Especially when I'm too lazy to select the new files i need to copy to my backup folder. I can just copy the whole folder and paste it there, and only the new files in the folder will be copied over, leaving the old files intact. Thanks!
googeling
Man, I feel I should just read through the entire history of likehacker, and then I can get things done so much quicker. At least, after I've read the entire history of lifehacker. :)
This second tip was GREAT, thanks!
vfreak
Whoa, I think my life just changed with that little tip.
Yep, totally different now.
Thanks Adam!
Gomerboy
I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around "No To All". Why not just NOT COPY the folder you are going to say "No To All" to?
Oh, I get it, you want SOME of the files copied, just not the duplicates.
Yeah, I'll save this tip in write only memory...
BlogsOfSteel
Thanks for the double tip. See what you can lead others to learn without meaning to.
wayfarer49
Darkmatter91
Blaine Moore
Wow! That's great to know.
math0ne
xcopy FTW, Yes!! I just used xcopy to copy most of a 200gb drive to a new one just yesterday!
cd path
xcopy *.* f:\path\* /e /y /h /c
then sit back and wait!
kratos76
@youngyew: Right, they are highlighted, however there have been so many times when I've copied 14GB of files, only to have 13.9GB highlighted when I return. Or better yet, a dialog box sitting there with a stupid confirmation question and 0 files copied.
Good thinking, MS. Teracopy (and others) FTW. Xcopy for us DOS renegades.
pdok
great tip, I had no idea you could do this!
jonezy
Like he sed in Vista you can just click the Checkbox and do the same for the following 59 errors. lol
ph15h
+1 for TeraCopy as the best fix here, and a big thanks to lifehacker.com for turning me on to it!
zbuffered
Excellent to know this for the next time I'm working with lots of files on someone else's machine!
I had totally forgotten about having this problem because I've been using TeraCopy since it was posted here [lifehacker.com]
It gives you a ton of options when it encounters an issue like this. The three in the normal XP dialog (in TeraCopy they're called Overwrite, Overwrite All, and Skip) but also has buttons for Skip All, Rename, Rename All, and Overwrite Older Only. Throw in the ability to pause and resume transfers, and it's probably one of the best software tips I've ever picked up from LH!
Shmoo
It was partly silliness like this in XP which led me to install TeraCopy and use it as the default file copy utility: it offers more conflict-resolution options than you can shake a stick at.
Well, it has a lot of other useful features too - but this has to be the one I've used the most often.
Lifehacker review
Teracopy homepage
jon_1308
very nice tip. Thank you.
balls187++
I can't say this never works, but I know that for me, it has not worked on quite a few tries, it may have been because of what pdok said above.
pvcrisp
@pdok:
If I'm not mistaken, Windows XP actually tells you the files that haven't been copied. After your disk / flash drive is full, go back to the original directory you copied the files from, you would notice that the files that haven't been copied have been highlighted.
Okay probably this doesn't work if you are copying the whole directory. But I think it works if you are copying a list of highlighted files.
youngyew
@pdok:
If I'm not mistaken, Windows XP actually tells you the files that haven't been copied. After your disk / flash drive is full, go back to the original directory you copied the files from, you would notice that the files that haven't been copied have been highlighted.
Okay probably this doesn't work if you are copying the whole directory. But I think it works if you are copying a list of highlighted files.
youngyew
It works most/some of the time, and not just on copying dialogs, but other things, like when applying attribute changes (indexing, etc.)
Other times, it does not work, like when the question is very specific. For instance, when the dialog pertains to a particular file type holding Shift does not prevent the same dialog for a different file type.
To its credit, Vista actually completes the copy job then informs you of the files that could not be copied and you can go over the discrepancies after the fact. Only took 11 years of Windows stupidity to fix a common irritant!
pdok
anthonylitz