WARNING: Versioner: can't remove directory XXX remove XXX The directory is not empty.

I have got this error today.

WARNING: Versioner: can't remove directory Dir1\Dir2 remove \\?\XXX\.stversions\Dir1\Dir2: The directory is not empty.
WARNING: Versioner: can't remove directory Dir1 remove \\?\XXX\.stversions\Dir1: The directory is not empty.

I have checked the .stversions folder manually, and sure enough, the two folders are there, but there are no files in either of them. It seems that Dir1 cannot be removed because Dir2 exists inside it, but Dir2 is just an empty folder itself.

I do not have much experience with versioning. Is this an expected situation, or has something gone wrong? Of course, I can just delete the empty folders by hand, but I would prefer to have everything dealt with automatically, if possible.

These are my versioning settings.

Did you enable “show hidden files” and “show system files” when you confirmed that Dir2 is not empty?

Yeah, those I have always enabled, and I also checked with dir /a /b /s just to make sure.

Do any of them have a custom icon or something? Or some weird properties?

I know windows sometimes screws up and prevents folder removal until reboot etc.

No, it is just a basic folder with no special settings. This is the very first time that I have seen this kind of an error though, and I have set the same type of versioning for basically all my folders on all devices, which likely means 100+ folders altogether. Everything else has been working fine, so this is not a big deal, but I am just wondering what the issue may actually be about.

I suggest you restart the machine and see if its still an issue. I also suspect it might fail via explorer at this point.

I left the machine alone, as it is a single-core setup with a 5400 rpm USB HDD, so restarting and rescanning takes forever. However, today the folder is gone, so I think that Syncthing has just managed to fix itself.

Thank you for all the answers and tips. I will come back if the problem re-appears in the future.

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