Few things annoy me more than Windows telling me a file can’t be deleted because it’s in use. I know the file is just sitting there idle and yet something is tying the file up keeping me from deleting it. You’ve probably seen the associated error message at some point: Error: Cannot Delete File or Folder. Often a reboot won’t solve the problem because the same process ties up the file following a reboot. Sometimes booting to Safe Mode will provide the necessary freedom to remove the file, but who wants to deal with the hassle of constant reboots. Finding the rogue process can require some detective work or you can enlist an application to handle the heavy lifting. To unlock a file from the process holding it hostage and delete the file for good, follow a few simple steps for deleting a file used by another person or program.