SharePoint designer is showing “Server error: this file may not be moved, deleted, renamed or otherwise edited”

Question

I want to edit the seatle.master master page for my enterprise wiki site collection. So I did the following:-

1. I copy the seatle.html inside the SP designer.

2. Paste it.

3. It automatically creates two new file seatle_copy(1).html & seatle_cop(1).master.

4. So I click on the seatle_copy(1).master.

5. But I receive the following error:-

Also if I try uploading a new file inside the master page gallery I will get this error:-

Please advise ?

Answer 1

You can't change the .master file when it's bound like this, you can only edit the .html file. It will re-generate the .master when you save the .html.

This is due to the Design Manager packet in SP2013. Here's the MSDN article on this feature set: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/jj822363(v=office.15).aspx

Answer 2

The issue is that you should copy seattle.html which will auto create a .master page for you, and there is a link between the files.

To resolve the issue,

• create a copy of seattle.html
• Now you have both a seattle_copy(1).html and seattle_copy(1).master.
• Next rename seattle_copy(1).html to for example test.html. A pop-up appears asking you to update pages that have hyperlinks to the page.
• Click “yes”.

- After the rename a file named test.master appears as well. - You can now select seattle_copy(1).master and delete it. If you want to delete your new custom master page, select the .html version and delete it. This will also delete the .master file.

Source: http://techmikael.blogspot.com/2013/02/issue-with-creating-copy-of.html

Answer 3

I had the same problem and here is what eventually worked for me:

First a little background, I copied oslo.master into a subfolder /_catalogs/masterpage/test for editing (I know, I know, only edit the HTML files, not the .MASTER files. I've learned my lesson.) I was not able to rename, edit, or delete the file using SP or SP Designer. The error was "Server error: This file may not be moved, deleted, renamed, or otherwise edited."

I was able to delete it by downloading the file (oslo.master) to my computer, rename it to oslo.html then use Master Page Gallery in SP to upload it. Be sure you change the Content Type to HTML MASTER PAGE and save. I was then able to use SP Designer to delete oslo.master and oslo.html

Answer 4

Nothing worked for me except this solution here:

How to: resolve ‘Server Error: This file may not be moved, deleted … ‘ when working with SharePoint master page

In case link is broken, below is the answer:

SharePoint 2013 has an *.HTML file associated with each *.master and you’re really supposed to edit the *.HTML file and not touch the *.master.

But if you created the *.master file by other means and try to rename, delete, or edit it’s properties, SharePoint will try to access the associated *.html file and there isn’t one and being SharePoint, you will get an error.

Solution (from the link above):**

To solve this and get rid of the error, do this:

• Copy the existing *.html file in the gallery

• Rename the copied *.html file to the name you wish to give (or have already given) to your custom master page

• To delete the masterpage, delete respective *.html file instead, etc

Answer 5

Had same error but with Page Layouts. .aspx files stayed in directory and there were no way to drop them.

My solution: open html file properties in "Master Page Gallery" in browser, and double check that type is "HTML Page Layout" (in my case it was "Page Layout"). Change this, save, then I was able to go to "Design Manager" -> "Page Layouts" (/_layouts/15/DesignPageLayouts.aspx), and remove page from there.

In my case there were only aspx files, so I copy-pasted html with same name, and then changed "HTML Layout" property..