Re: What's the story on Content.IE5?

"Wesley Vogel" <123WVogel955@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>Hi Terry,
>
>Who's Ed?

Sorry! Rattled off two replies in quick succession - guess I can
expect a similar reply from Ed shortly, asking 'Who's Wesley?' <g>

>107....../ files are cookies. OK. I delete all cookies.

Hmm, all of them. And daily I see from your later comment. That gives
me more food for thought.

I see I have 1,371 of them, with no easy way of sorting wheat from
chaff. I'll re-check, but I think my regular Spybot scans report a
small proportion of these as 'Trivial', and I usually ignore. I've
always assumed that 99% of them are not only unharmful but positively
add some value by eliminating need to re-enter stuff like usernames,
etc. I suppose I need a refresher on this subject... Your summary
below is a good start, thank you.

>As with anything involving Temporary Internet Files, this gets confusing.
>
>The "cookies" in the Temporary Internet Files Folder are just pointers to
>the real cookies, like a shortcut.
>
>Real cookies are stored here >>
>%homepath%\Cookies
>or
>C:\Documents and Settings\Your Name Here\Cookies
>
>The Delete Cookies button deletes the cookies here >>
>%homepath%\Cookies
>or
>C:\Documents and Settings\Your Name Here\Cookies
>
>But it also deletes the pointers to the real cookies here >>
>%homepath%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files
>or
>C:\Documents and Settings\Your Name Here\Local Settings\Temporary Internet
>Files
>
>If you manually delete a cookie file from the Temporary Internet Files
>folder, both the pointer to the Cookies folder and the cookie file located
>in the Cookies folder are deleted.
>
>If you delete a cookie from the cookies folder it leaves the pointer to the
>cookie behind. But it's worthless. Just like a shortcut that does not
>point to anything.
>
>Example.
>C:\Documents and Settings\Wesley P. Vogel\Local Settings\Temporary Internet
>Files\Cookie:wesley p. vogel@xxxxxxxxxxxx/
>
>Properties of Cookie:wesley p. vogel@xxxxxxxxxxxx/ shows this; Cache name:
>wesley p. vogel@download[1].txt
>
>The real cookie is here...
>C:\Documents and Settings\Wesley P. Vogel\Cookies\wesley p.
>vogel@download[1].txt
>-----
>
>2.35MB is huge for an index.dat file.

1,371 cookies!

>C:\DOCUME~1\WESLEY~1.VOG\LOCALS~1\Temporary Internet
>Files\Content.IE5\index.dat is 112 KB. This morning it was 32 KB. This
>index.dat gets deleted at every boot by a batch file.

>Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\index.dat file is hard to delete
>because it is in use. There are several ways around this. A batch file
>that deletes it before it's in use. Logging on as another user and then
>deleting it. And more.
>
>I do not necessarily believe this...
>
>[[Index.dat is the Internet Explorer cache index file. It facilitates the
>browser cache mechanism that speeds access to frequently accessed web pages
>across different browser processes in the same user context.]]
>
>From...
>Temporary Internet Files Use More Disk Space Than Specified
>http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;301057
>
>-----
>
>Content.IE5 is not visible from Windows Explorer, it doesn't matter what
>settings you have set, you have to sneak up on it.
>
>According to PA Bear and Frank Saunders, "Smoke and mirrors."
>
>The index.dat & desktop.ini files are the smoke generators.
>
>Temporary Internet Files folder is a Virtual Folder and a Namespace object.
>Has something to do with being a shell folder with its own GUID. I don't
>understand half of this. Anyway, moving along.
>
>Temporary Internet Files folders are Special Folders, like My Documents, My
>Music, My Computer, Recycle Bin, et cetera. Part of what makes them special
>is the GUID or Globally Unique Identifier. These are found in the registry,
>where the GUID is the identifier for the special folder. They are found
>here: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID. The GUID for Temporary Internet Files is
>{7BD29E00-76C1-11CF-9DD0-00A0C9034933}.
>
>Part of this is because of the desktop.ini file.
>
>Most Temporary Internet Files folders are Hidden and classified as system
>files. They are hidden from Windows Explorer and Search. The device used
>to hide them is the desktop.ini file. The desktop.ini signals that they are
>system files, hidden and if deleted, they are recreated on the next boot.
>To find them, you have to discover them by accident or know where to look.
>
>The Desktop.ini file is a text file that specifies how a file system folder
>will be viewed and handled.
>
>Some info on Desktop.ini files pieced together from many sources...
>
>File system folders are commonly displayed with a standard icon and set of
>properties, which specify, for instance, whether or not the folder is
>shared. The Desktop.ini file is a text file that specifies how a file
>system folder will be viewed and handled. The most common use of the
>Desktop.ini file is to assign a custom icon to a folder.
>
>The desktop.ini can have info that lists the folder as a system file, hidden
>and if deleted, it is recreated on the next boot. The desktop.ini can also
>have info like a UICLSID line that hides the folder in Windows Explorer. And
>a CLSID line that disables the Search utility from searching through the
>folder.
>
>Also the folder name info can be listed in the desktop.ini. For example,
>the folder Shared Documents becomes just Documents if you remove the
>desktop.ini.
>
>Desktop.ini for Content.IE5:
>[.ShellClassInfo]
>UICLSID={7BD29E00-76C1-11CF-9DD0-00A0C9034933}
>
>Desktop.ini for History.IE5:
>[.ShellClassInfo]
>UICLSID={7BD29E00-76C1-11CF-9DD0-00A0C9034933}
>CLSID={FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000}
>
>The UICLSID line hides the folder in Windows Explorer. The CLSID line
>disables the Search utility from searching through the folder.
>
>If you delete the desktop.ini then the folders are no longer special and
>become visible. However, they will be recreated at next boot. You can fool
>Windows by editing the desktop.ini leaving only the [.ShellClassInfo] line.

I've always been very cavalier about any Desktop.ini files I
encounter, deleting them casually! Maybe *too* cavalier?


>I have to put all this info into one document one day. :-)

Great post, thanks. Duly filed, as I will undoubtedly need to refer to
it again.

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK
.