Folder Names Truncated after the Dot (Period) in Explorer

If folder names containing one or more dot (.) in the name are truncated in Explorer, this may have to do with third-party shell extensions or corrupted folder view settings.

For example, if you have folders like the ones below, with one or more dots or periods ( . ) in the folder name, as below:

• Project.5.0_Branch
• Project.5.1_Branch
• Project.5.2_Branch
• Project.5.3_Branch
• Project.5.4_Branch

File Explorer may display it as:

• Product.5
• Product.5
• Product.5
• Product.5
• Product.5

The last dot and the character(s) after the last dot are cut off. Note that this happens regardless of your Hide extension for known file types choice in Folder Options → View tab.

In all the cases we’ve seen this happened after installing TortoiseSVN. It’s implemented as a Windows shell extension, that helps programmers manage different versions of the source code for their programs.

Fix: Folder Names Truncated after the Dot (Period) in Explorer

To resolve the problem, use one of the following methods:

1. Run Microsoft File and Folder diagnostics

The folder diagnostics troubleshooter resets the folder view settings, repairs the Recycle Bin, fixes the FolderDescriptions registry keys, etc., automatically.

This tool should fix the problem for most users.

2: Reset folder views manually or using a Script

Resetting the folder views ought to fix the problem. If the above tool can’t reset it for some reason, use the script or manual procedure described in the article Reset Folder Views in Windows 10 and Earlier

3. Disable 3rd party shell extensions to test

Explorer.exe process loads shell extensions during user login. Buggy shell extensions can cause various problems such as corrupting folder views, error message when right-clicking on a file or folder, or slow response of File Explorer, etc.

See section Disable 3rd party extensions in the article How to Clean boot Windows using Autoruns