After deleting/moving files out of folder until they are empty and fixing up redirectors, often times there are “empty” folders that can’t be deleted because even though they show no files in them in the editor, if you check them in the file explorer outside of the editor, you will find they have files in them that should have been moved/deleted already. What is going on with this? How do I fix it? Am I supposed to manually move those files outside the editor in a file explorer, that are still left in those folders that were supposed to be moved?
Inside the engine right click the folder and click on “fix redirections in folder” after that you should be able to delete the folder.
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I already did before this even happened, I did it on the entire content folder. I even tried again after this empty folder thing happened and nothing changed, it doesn’t do anything to fix it. I fix redirectors and literally nothing happens. When I initially moved and deleted some of the files of that folder, and then fixed redirectors it showed it moving/cleaning up stuff, but after that it ended up with this empty folder issue. So after that happened I tried fixing redirectors again and nothing pops up, literally nothing happens.
To remove multiple parents and empty nodes from the outliner Download Meshmatic and use this tutorial to minimize the outliner. https://meshmatic3d.com/knowledge-base-2/outliner-clean-up/
Because I wanted to confirm if what I thought is true is true, I copied the project folder to the 4.24.0 Preview 2 version of the engine, sure enough when I attempted to move that same folder it also caused issues. Not only was the issue not fixed from 4.22.3, but it’s actually worse in 4.24.0, it actually will crash the entire editor now if you attempt to move the folder… You can follow another related topic of mine which ties into this one here, Is it not safe to move or delete any blueprint related files? - Content Creation - Unreal Engine Forums
Below is an update to my post:
Preview 2 crashes when moving folders in the content browser, on Linux. This same folder causes issues when attempting to move it in 4.22.3 as well, when attempting to move it and fix redirectors it leaves “empty” folders there instead that can’t be moved or deleted, where if you look outside the editor in the file explorer you will see files left in those 'empty" folders.
“Exception was “SIGSEGV: unaligned memory access (SIMD vectors?)””
Caught signal
libUE4Editor-Engine.so!UWorld::Tick(ELevelTick, float) [/Engine/Source/Runtime/Engine/Private/LevelTick.cpp:1722]
libUE4Editor-UnrealEd.so!UEditorEngine::Tick(float, bool) [/Engine/Source/Editor/UnrealEd/Private/EditorEngine.cpp:1504]
libUE4Editor-UnrealEd.so!UUnrealEdEngine::Tick(float, bool) [/Engine/Source/Editor/UnrealEd/Private/UnrealEdEngine.cpp:407]
UE4Editor!FEngineLoop::Tick() [/Engine/Source/Runtime/Launch/Private/LaunchEngineLoop.cpp:4479]
UE4Editor!GuardedMain(char16_t const*) [/Engine/Source/Runtime/Launch/Private/Launch.cpp:175]
libUE4Editor-UnixCommonStartup.so!CommonUnixMain(int, char**, int (*)(char16_t const*), void (*)()) [/Engine/Source/Runtime/Unix/UnixCommonStartup/Private/UnixCommonStartup.cpp:242]
libc.so.6!__libc_start_main(+0xf2)
UE4Editor!_start()
part of the log:
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 206 for folder '/Content/Maps/Demonstration_sharedassets' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 204 for folder '/Content/Maps' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 209 for folder '/Content/Particles' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 206 for folder '/Content/Maps/Demonstration_sharedassets' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 204 for folder '/Content/Maps' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogDirectoryWatcher: Error: inotify_rm_watch cannot remove descriptor 209 for folder '/Content/Particles' (errno = 22, Invalid argument)
73]LogAudioMixer: Display: Audio Buffer Underrun detected.
73]LogCore: === Critical error: ===
Unhandled Exception: SIGSEGV: unaligned memory access (SIMD vectors?)
73]LogCore: Fatal error!
Ok, didn’t know that because there was no further information.
Am still having this issue occur with many marketplace & Epic folders, even when testing on Windows on 4.25.4
IF you really want to get rid of stuff, close the editor. access the project folder. delete the files. re-start the editor. let it ***** about the fact stuff isn’t there. fix up redirection in content folder, and manually go through the errors you get from “failed to load” to remove things off the levels they may be found in - which clears up the references.
IF the issue is that you have too much stuff you don’t need and want to get rid of from your project, then the problem is that you are adding marketplace stuff to the project. Always create a “slush” project to put the marketplace content in and test, then manually migrate the BPs or things you need so you have a clean working environment (and you know what folder things are in).
If you can not select a folder, after fixing re-directors, and can not simply delete it from the browser this is a strong indication that there is still files contained with in the directory that is not visible to the browser.
- Fixing the directors in just that folder does not always fix all of the references to that folder from the game root. You can have redirectors that point to folders containing redirectors and in the process creating a chain.
- It’s know that content providers will included the master FBX file in the same folder as the asset. This file is not visible to the browser folder but will prevent deletion as the folder is not empty.
- Backwards migration of an asset in a more recent version into an older version. I would say this would be the most common problem as migrating from a newer version will not show up in the later version until the engine is the same.
If you can not delete from the browser the simple solution is to browse to the folder and check it out visually. If there is an orphan file, like n FBX source then you can delete it from the explorer.
As well
At times the folder will not delete until you save the project, exit, and reload.
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if you follow mosthoss advice, then you end up with tons of lost references. even for one material that may result in e.g. 5 textures whos name nor location you know.
open the material, select the right texture. Problem solved.
if the referneces to the textures are lost, there is nothing that helps you to find the correct texture. so youre solution “select the right texture” requires you to locate the correct texture for each material that has been used before, e.g. for roughness, normal and so on. good luck with that.
it may only work if you know and remember the setup in detail e.g. because you just made the material by yourself, but then you still have to remember each single texture and find its location, and manually insert it again. for any bought or otherwise gotten material thats hard work, sometimes not even possible e.g. as there have been re-used textures from the engine folder or anything where the textures for one material are not stored together completely.
Normally - if you are working on a professional project - you know exactly what you need to replace by the name you are provided with.
this should also be true for any marketplace content since one of the publishing rules is that every texture has to be properly named with an identifier.
Either way, remove the object using the material (find references to the material, remove the meshes that use it).
then remove the meshes from the levels.
That will fix the problem of having to find textures.
The assumption from above was that you need to get rid of stuff. Not find a replacement for it.