ld.exe: cannot open output file … : Permission denied

Question

I recently installed CodeBlocks with mingw32 on Windows 7 Ultimate 32bit in order to dust off my c skills, but this problem has me somewhat stumped.

I decided to fire off a short Fibonacci generator to make sure my setup was working, but I ran into a hurdle.

The program compiles, links and whatnot like a charm and I get a corresponding executable which runs as expected.

The problems occur if I try to compile again, then I get the following:

c:/codeblocks/mingw/bin/../lib/gcc/mingw32/4.4.1/../../../../mingw32/bin/ld.exe: cannot open output file bin\Debug\Fibonacci.exe: Permission denied

I can't even edit the permissions of the generated executable.

I've checked the usual suspects:

• Executable is verily not running.
• Path to executable is read/writable to mingw32 (otherwise it wouldn't be able to build in the first place)
• I'm not running cygwin in any shape or form.

And now for the funny bit: Usually after a few minutes, any executables generated by mingw32 which are displaying this Access Denied behaviour will automatically vanish without any intervention from me.

I've googled this somewhat, but most of the other results were either vague or inapplicable.

I wonder whether there is some Windows 7 security setting playing havoc with my .exe's, but I'm not that knowledgeable about Win 7 as to know where to begin searching.

Any one have any ideas?

Answer 1

I had exactly the same problem right after switching off some (in my opinion unneccessary) Windows services. It turned out that when I switched ON again the "Application Experience" everything resumed working fine.

May be you simply have to turn on this service? To switch ON Application Experience:

1. Click the Windows start buttonn.

2. In the box labeled "Search programs and files" type services.msc and click the search button. A new window with title "Services" opens.

3. Right click on "Application Experience" line and select "Properties" from popup menu.

4. Change Startup type to "Automatic (delayed start)".

5. Restart computer.

Application Experiences should prevent the problem in the future.

Answer 2

If you think the executable is locked by a process, try Process Explorer from SysInternals. In the File/handle, enter Fibonacci.exe and you should see who holds the file.

If it is not enough, you can use Process Monitor (from SysInternals, again) to follow the activity of all processes on your system on Fibonacci.exe. With a little bit of analysis (call stacks), you'll may find out why the access to the file is denied and what make it disappear.

Answer 3

Your program is still running. You have to kill it by closing the command line window. If you press control alt delete, task manager, process`s (kill the ones that match your filename).

Answer 4

The Best solution is go to console in eclipse IDE and click the red button to terminate the program. You will see the your program is running and output can be seen there. :) !!

Answer 5

I had the same behaviour, and fixed it by running Code::Blocks as administrator.

Answer 6

1. Open task manager -> Processes -> Click on .exe (Fibonacci.exe) -> End Process

   if it doesn't work

2. Close eclipse IDE (or whatever IDE you use) and repeat step 1.

Answer 7

I had a similar problem. Using a freeware utility called Unlocker (version 1.9.2), I found that my antivirus software (Panda free) had left a hanging lock on the executable file even though it didn't detect any threat. Unlocker was able to unlock it.

Answer 8

Got the same issue. Read this. Disabled the antivirus software (mcaffee). Et voila

Confirmed by the antivirus log:

Blocked by Access Protection rule d:\mingw64\x86_64-w64-mingw32\bin\ld.exe d:\workspace\cpp\bar\foo.exe User-defined Rules:ctx3 Action blocked : Create

Answer 9

It may be your Antivirus Software.

In my case Malwarebytes was holding a handle on my program's executable:

Using Process Explorer to close the handle, or just disabling antivirus for a bit work just fine.

Answer 10

Problem Cause : The process of the current program is still running without interuption. (This is the reason why you haven't got this issue after a restart)

The fix is simple : Go to cmd and type the command taskkill -im process-name.exe -f

Eg:

 taskkill -im demo.exe -f

here,

demo - is my program name

Answer 11

I got this error when using the Atom editor and mingw (through a package called gpp-compiler) for C++. Closing the open console window fixed my issue.

Answer 12

i experienced a similar issue. Bitdefender automatically quarantined each exe-file i created by MinGW g++. Instead of the full exe-file i found a file with a weird extension 'qzquar' testAutoPtr1.exe.48352.gzquar

When i opened quarantined items in Bitdefender i found my exe-file quarantined there.