Cannot read directory...Modification time could not be parsed. (1600-12-31T23:59:59.999Z)

[BazCuda]

I'm really hoping someone can help me resolve this problem.
FFS was working brilliantly for me, but it's now completely unusable.

I use it solely to keep my secondary hard drive (B:) and my Google Drive in sync.
I also use other software, such as rclone, and DriveSync (on Android) to administer my Google Drive, both of which (obviously) exploit the GD API.

I have one folder at the root level of my Google Drive called "B". This matches my local B: drive.
Both have a capacity of 2TB.

Below this are about 30 subfolders which constitute my Google Drive proper, and categorise all my files, e.g. from "ADB" and "Android_Dev", through "Images" and "Music", to "Videos" and "Visual_Studio".

I have an FFS job for each of the 30 subfolders, and I've been gradually copying all the files down from my Google Drive to my B: drive, sorting out duplicate files and folders on GD, and getting my FFS "good boy" green ticks :D

I also have an overall job setup, "_B", which was to be my realtime sync batch job, initiated by Task Scheduler at login, to monitor local file deletions and moves, and to copy down new files uploaded from my Android phone.

I had just got to the point where I had mirrored the entire 2TBs (~500k files).
I then used a Windows File Explorer shell extension to change the modified dates on some files in the "ADB" folder with my Google Drive mounted as X: ..... wrong ! (at least, I assume this is what broke it - difficult to be 100% sure).

Now, every time I browse to my Google Drive in FFS to select a folder, I get the following error message:

Cannot read directory "gdrive:\myemail@gmail.com\B".
Modification time could not be parsed. (1600-12-31T23:59:59.999Z)

Sometimes it doesn't even get as far as drawing the tree containing my GD's root folder and the "B" folder; it will give this error message for the root of my Google Drive. I can't expand the tree to get to the subfolders within "B".

I've tried using rclone to reset the modification datetimes to valid API-compliant datetimes.
I've tried renaming folders using GD's web interface in Chrome, including the "ADB" folder, and then renaming them back again, to try and get Google Drive itself to write valid modified datetimes to my drive.

Nothing works.
Well, I say nothing; all the other software I use still works just as well as it did before and has absolutely no problems with my GD. I even installed MountainDuck to permanently mount my GD as a local drive and it's perfectly happy. It's only FFS that has this bizarre problem with some date, somewhere on my GD, possibly at the root.

I can't even run the individual folder jobs that were working. They produce exactly the same error - sometimes for "gdrive:\myemail@gmail.com" itself ("..can't be found.."), and sometimes for the individual folder, e.g. "gdrive:\myemail@gmail.com\Music\", but always reporting that same date from the 1600s !

I have uninstalled and re-installed FFS twice now - the second time going through my entire file system and the Registry making sure there was absolutely no trace of FFS anywhere, reinstalling and re-authenticating FFS's access to my GoogleDrive.....same error, same date.

Does anyone have any idea what I can do, either with FFS, or rclone, or Google's web interface, that will rectify this problem (as FFS sees it) ?

Thanks in advance. I really want to use FFS, but after two solid days of trying to resolve this on my own in numerous [devious] ways before contacting the forum, I seem to be getting to the end of the FFS road, which I'm hugely disappointed about.

TL;DR version
Cannot read directory "gdrive:\myemail@gmail.com\B".
Modification time could not be parsed. (1600-12-31T23:59:59.999Z)
Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp !!! :)

Baz.

[BazCuda]

Hold your horses !!
Isn't that just typical. I took one last look from a different viewpoint using rclone.

There were two shortcuts (.lnk) in the root of the B folder that have the 1600 date as the last modified. Goodness knows how they got that date in the first place. I've just deleted them and the FFS browser has sprung back into life.

There are a few others with this date which I'll work through and correct.

I'll do some experimenting with syncing folder and see if my issue has been resolved.

[BazCuda]

That's definitely resolved it. What also threw me at 3am this morning, is that rclone correctly reports those rogue files as having a modified date in the 1600s, whereas the Google Drive web interface shows the 1 Jan 1970 Unix epoch date. This may be their response to (like FFS) also not being able to parse the 1600 dates - but 1 Jan 1970 is incorrect and misleading when you're trying to track down something with a modified date of 1600-12-31 !

Anyway, all sorted now. FFS working as it was before.

Thanks for listening. It's been emotional :D :D :D

Baz.

[Zenju]

Thanks for your report! The time parsing issue has been fixed for the next release :)

[BazCuda]

Excellent news. Thanks Zenju.

[fredphoesh]

Hello folks, I hope you are all well and staying safe...

I have been getting the "Modification time could not be parsed" quite a lot, trying to backup my photos to my Google Drive. It also says "Cannot read directory "gdrive:\myaccount\THE-PATH"

I am using FreeFileSync_10.23_[Donation_Edition]

Any good news on a way to stop that error?
Thanks,
Mark.

[Zenju]

I have been getting the "Modification time could not be parsed" quite a lot, trying to backup my photos to my Google Drive. It also says "Cannot read directory "gdrive:\myaccount\THE-PATH"

Can you post the full error message?

[fredphoesh]

I have been getting the "Modification time could not be parsed" quite a lot, trying to backup my photos to my Google Drive. It also says "Cannot read directory "gdrive:\myaccount\THE-PATH"

Can you post the full error message?

Hi, OMG almost a year later, I did not know you had replied. Does the "Notify Me" option work?
Anyway, the error says

Cannot read directory "gdrive:\mark.palmos@videoblurb.com\BACKUPS\1 PHOTOS+VIDEOS\PHOTOS\1972 madi family slides".
Modification time could not be parsed. (1968-05-03T11:30:00.000Z)

[therube]

(With a quick look, date/time appear to be good.
ISO 8601.
ISO 8601 date.)

[fredphoesh]

(With a quick look, date/time appear to be good.
ISO 8601.
ISO 8601 date.)

Hi, tx, so what could the problem be, any idea?

[Zenju]

Cannot read directory "gdrive:\mark.palmos@videoblurb.com\BACKUPS\1 PHOTOS+VIDEOS\PHOTOS\1972 madi family slides".
Modification time could not be parsed. (1968-05-03T11:30:00.000Z)

Fixed with FreeFileSync 11.12. Thanks for the report.