How to do ‘No To All’ When Copying Files

Have you noticed that XP gives you the ‘Yes to all’ option in its file copy dialog box, which is useful if you would like to overwrite files in a directory with newer files of the same name from another location, but fails to offer a ‘No to all’ option for doing the opposite? Annoying, if you think about it.

 

What if you have a lengthy file copy operation partially finished, and wish to restart it? If you use the default options, you essentially have to recopy every file, since saying ‘No’ to every duplicate file will take just as long.

Fortunately, there’s a way to tell XP not to copy all duplicated files, with a single command.

 

To do this, when the file copy dialog box appears asking you whether you wish to overwrite the first file, hold down [Shift] and click ‘No’. This will automatically answer ‘No’ for all the files that follow!

 

Note, however, that XP will ask you again for the first new folder it encounters. Follow the same procedure to answer ‘No’ automatically for all the folders.

 

(thanks to digit for this tip)