I hope I am in the right forum.My question (and problem) is about read-only attributes on large numbers of files.I have my OS (XP and W7) and all application programs on drive C. All date files and pictures are on drive D. When booted into W7, Excel and Word (ver Office 2002) files created under XP always open as "read-only" and cannot be edited. Files created under W7 open normally.Using Windows Explorer I can open the file properties as properties/Security tab/Users/Edit/permissions/ and give "user" full access permissions. But that is a time consuming and cumbersome procudure when dealing with hunderds of files.Does anyone have an easier way?To be clear, I am a single user on this machine and have not set up passwords to log in as administrator or some particular user.

One way is to use the CACLS utility. CACLS Group Permissions Capabilities: Rating posts helps other users Mark L. Ferguson MS-MVP

If all of your files are located within the same directory structure, you can easily replace permissions on all subfolders and files. At the security tab of the folder in question, click the Advanced button in the lower-right corner. Click the Change Permissions button and acknowledge the UAC prompt. Make sure that the Replace all child object permissions with inheritable permissions form this object option is selected when you select your current Windows 7 user account.