Symbian Blog

Deleting "Stuck" Installer Files in S60 3rd Edition

I have seen a problem with “stuck” installer files in S60 3rd Edition phones for a couple of times. The information from Application Manager shows that the applications are not installed. However, they cannot be deleted because there is no Delete menu (see screenshot below). They cannot be re-installed either because it always fails with “Unable to install” message. Those files are basically just stuck there.

From my opinion, it looks like a bug in S60 3rd Edition (not sure if this has been fixed in S60 3rd FP1). I don’t really know how to reproduce this problem, but it has happened to my phones several times. Once, I saw this problem after one application failed to install. In other occasions, I saw this problem after resetting my phone to the default factory settings.

What should we do if we have this kind of “stuck” installer files in S60 3rd Edition? One way is to delete the installer file manually via Windows Explorer. Unfortunately, we cannot use any file manager application because those files are located in a protected folder.

* Firstly, connect your phone to a PC via USB.U can also try card reader.
* Choose Data Transfer (a.k.a. Mass Storage). Do not select PC Suite because you won’t be able to browse protected folders in PC Suite mode.
* Open Windows Explorer on your PC.
* Go to \private\10202dce on the phone’s folder.
* There, you should be able to find the installer files (.sis). Just remove them using Windows Explorer.