TeaTimer 1.5.0.9 keeps some files locked

[SirDracula]

I'm having some auto-update issues with ZoneAlarm Security Suite 7.0.423 and I traced it down to TeaTimer 1.5.0.9. Here's what happens:

- ZA gets its update files and stores them in C:\WINDOWS\system32\ZoneLabs\Updates as a zip file

- ZA then unpacks the zip file and creates a bunch of temp directories and files in the same directory above

- ZA applies its updates

- ZA attempts to delete the temp files *it* created and it fails because TeaTimer is keeping these files locked

Questions:

1) Why does TeaTimer even lock these temp files?

2) Why doesn't TeaTimer ever release these locks? I waited and waited and used Unlocker to check the locks on these temp files and they were still there for a long time. They didn't go away until I killed TeaTimer.

This looks like a bug to me somewhere in TeaTimer where it forgets to unlock some files.

Could you please look into it? Thanks.

[PepiMK]

Hmmmm a lock for a split of a second would be expected - that happens when TeaTimer checks the file before it gets executed, for example.

But I've created this project tools issue for the problem (don't forget to vote there ). I've heard it before, but didn't receive any details to some concrete application that could be used to reproduce the problem, your post might have helped a lot there

[SirDracula]

Hmmmm a lock for a split of a second would be expected - that happens when TeaTimer checks the file before it gets executed, for example.

But I've created this project tools issue for the problem (don't forget to vote there ). I've heard it before, but didn't receive any details to some concrete application that could be used to reproduce the problem, your post might have helped a lot there

Yes, the lock is definitely very stubborn. I voted for the issue. If you would like to give me a debug version that can collect more info, I'd be happy to send you a log, I think I can reproduce this problem easily.

[SirDracula]

Any update on this? It is really affecting being able to get ZoneAlarm anti-spyware automatic updates. I have to kill TeaTimer and update ZA by hand and then restart TT again.

[InfotechCapital]

What is your technical level? Would you be comfortable running SysInternals tools, like FileMon?

The reason I ask is that these utilities can reveal what's happening but frequently report a *massive* amount of information. For your purposes, I would suggest terminating all other processes, starting FileMon, clearing the buffer + starting a capture, then initiating a ZoneAlarm update. As soon as it finishes, stop the capture and filter FileMon's output on module, or for anything other than successes. If you don't see anything remarkable and the files *do* go away, you may also discover that one of the other processes you terminated was contributing to the problem--but until you try it it's hard to say.

Other utilities that can reveal useful information are: Handle, RegMon, and Process Monitor--but it gets deep pretty quickly. One final comment is that antivirus software can get in the way, creating a combination problem. Symantec's realtime protection, under very specific (but unfortunately common) circumstances, can block Windows Explorer from releasing a lock on a file; following, if you're running an antivirus product, try turning it off while running a ZA update.

[PepiMK]

That's about how I tracked the problem dwn btw
You don't even have to close down other processes, but set the filters inside FileMon to only show TeaTimer.exe and updclient.exe .