title: Can no Longer open Spyder IDE for Python Programming
body: <p>I installed Python 3.4 on my Windows 7 laptop several months ago as part of Anaconda (<a href="https://www.continuum.io/downloads" rel="noreferrer">https://www.continuum.io/downloads</a>). My installation included the Spyder IDE, and I have successfully been using Spyder for Python programming.</p>
  
  <p>However, since yesterday, I have been unable to open Spyder. I typically open Spyder via the Start Menu, but now, when I try to click on the Spyder icon in the Start Menu, I get no response. I then tried to go directly to the spyder.exe file in the Scripts folder in the directory where Anaconda is installed. When I clicked on this the first time, the following message flashed quickly and then disappeared:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\Scripts\spyder-script.py". line 2, in &lt;module&gt;
      start_app.main()
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\start_app.py", line 114, in main
      from spyderlib import spyder
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\spyder.py", line 100 in &lt;module&gt;
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\qt\QtSvg.py", line 10 in &lt;module&gt;
      from PyQt4.QtSvg import * # analysis:ignore
  ImportError:DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I double-clicked on Spyder.exe a second time, and this time, received the following message:</p>
  
  <pre><code>kfile.py", line 146 in lock
      symlinke(str(os.getpid()), self.name)
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\utils\external\lockfile.py", line 87, in symlink
      os.rmdir(newlinkname)
  OSError: [WinError 145] The directory is not empty: 'C:\\Users\\Aniket\\.spyder2-py3\\spyder.lock.1459432906109.newlink'
  
  During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:
  
  Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\Scripts\spyder-script.py". line 2, in &lt;module&gt;
      start_app.main()
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\start_app.py", line 106, in main
      from spyderlib import spyder
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\spyder.py", line 100 in &lt;module&gt;
    File "C:\Users\Aniket\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyderlib\qt\QtSvg.py", line 10 in &lt;module&gt;
      from PyQt4.QtSvg import * # analysis:ignore
  ImportError:DLL load failed: The specified module could not be found
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Both of these messages flashed very quickly and then disappeared - I captured them by quickly pressing Print Screen when they appeared. It's not evident to me what the error messages imply, nor what would have caused this. It's possible that I closed Spyder while some function was running, or that Spyder crashed and caused some persistent error. Does anyone know how I can fix this?</p>