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C:\Windows\Temporary Internet Files

1K views 8 replies 5 participants last post by  brendandonhu 
#1 ·
I am using IE5.5 and to have IE remove the file contents in the Temporary Internet File folder when IE is closed, do I insert a check mark in the block or do I remove the check mark if one is there. Of course, to see the option to do this in IE, clickon Tools>Internet Options>Advanced and scroll to the question.
Don't know why this little "nothing" is confusing me:p
And as always, TIA
 
#3 ·
Thanks MDM. I thought the check mark is needed and that is what I have BUT, removal of the file names does not appear to be removed when I close IE or even close down the machine!!
That was why I posted my question.
Usually the first two files listed there are *.admdt.txt and ads.enlivens. Maybe they are put there when I visit our board!! Possible?? I have those listed in Internet Properties>Security>Restricted Sites. These files appear to be "mirrored" in the Cookies folder also and that may be as it should be.
Cookies and Temporary Internet Files questions seem to be seen quiet often in TSG.
Thanks for your time taken while answering my query. Feel free to address the additional comments.
 
#4 ·
If you want to delete the index.dat but want to keep a cache for IE, no need to mess with DOS. As these files are locked by explorer.exe, you can't delete them but there is a trick to bypass the problem, you rename the folder where the index.dat is located. For instance, you can rename the folder Content.IE5 to whatever you want. After the next reboot, you will be able to delete the entire old folder Content.IE5 with all its files.
Windows will create a new Content.IE5 folder with a clean index.dat and 4 brand-new sub-folders.
Same for Windows\Cookies, just rename the folder cookies in another name and it will be possible to delete the index.dat in Cookies after a reboot.

For those who want to get permanently rid of cache and/or history : Either

- Change the file attributes of the index.dat to +r (read-only) while in DOS.

- Or delete the index.dat (in DOS) and create a *directory* called index.dat at the same place where index.dat *file* was. When you will reboot, Windows is bluffed and no file will be written to IE's cache. I've tested it and it works pretty good, IE doesn't write anything to TIF but that's maybe too hard for a lot of people.

- Or change the attributes of the TIF folder to read-only (not tested)
 
#5 ·
And many thanks to you pgriffet. I have read about the solution you have written about and it is far more involved than I care to pursue. The cookies are not troubling me to the extent that I care to "re-arrange" MS. I just thought that they were supposed to be deleted if IE were setup as discussed here.
 
#6 ·
No, it deletes everything except for cookies and fav.ico files.

IE6 gives the extra option to manually delete cookies
(in IE Options -> General tab)
but this will delete all of your cookies
(you might want to save some of the more important ones?)
Though this feature is not in IE5.x

atdmt.com is an advertising spyware cookie.
You can manually delete the one in Temp Internet Files (per-session cookies) and, if it's still there afterwards, you can manually delete the (permanent/stored) atdmt cookie in the Cookies dir.
If this site is already in Restricted Zone then the cookies won't come back again.

Download and run spybot and/or ad-aware to automatically delete all spyware cookies
(and any other spyware on your system).
After the results appear and before removing the cookies, make a note of the sites so you can add them to the Restricted Zone later.

I've made up a text list containing ~100 spyware sites here

I've also exported the key where all ^those^ Restricted Sites are stored in the Registry:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\Domains

WinNT/2k/XP version
Win9x/ME version

You can rt click -> save target as
then remove the .txt part at the end of the filename so it becomes
RestrictedSitesNT.reg instead of RestrictedSitesNT.reg.txt
Then you can double click this saved file to merge it into your registry

Or, as many other people do, you can use SpywareBlaster which automates the process and automatically blocks spyware from being installed.

Hope this helps ?!
 
#7 ·
Buf-The Egg is right on. You need some cookies to access certain sites or you will have to enter info everytime you try to access the site. You can export your needed cookies(look under File) and every now and then delete all of them then Import them back. You can also just delete the IE5 folder under TIF and it will recreate itself on the next bootup as was previously mentioned.

PS-This is from WhitPhil on another forum and is a very good explanation of cookies:

The real cookies are the one you see in \Cookies.
The ones in \TIF are just "pointers" to the real ones. The \TIF is the IE browser cache and placing cookie pointers here is just part of the architecture.
If you ever decide to delete cookies manually, delete them from the \TIF folder. If you delete them from \Cookies, there will be dangling pointers left behind in the \TIF folder.
 
#8 ·
The Egg/Deke:
Thank both of you for your help and info in this matter. Yep, I know that "certain" cookies are very much needed--it is those that get called cookies what are anything but help. Help is not spelled as trouble . I have a copy of Whitphil's answer setting among my documents because I think it is a good one. Don't recall when I put it there.
I have SpywareBlaster installed and now I am gonna take a long hard look at what it does. I have used AdAware and Spybot for some time now and really think they are great--well AdAware is back to great now that their definitions are more current; etc. Have either of you read about some outfit "stole/modified" these excellent apps?? Part of their name is Blue.....I read about it somewhere just recently and I don't know when this occurred.
BTW, The Egg---that is a large listing of parasites you have there and if SpywareBlaster will take care of these, and others, I'll be happier.:D
 
#9 ·
SpywareBlaster will take care of many of those, but some just leave tracking cookies which will be cleaned up by Spybot or AdAware. But its not an emergency situation to remove these.

I wouldn't reccommend blocking tempoary internet files and index.dat and cookies, Microsoft put them there for a reason, even if they didn't do a good job of it, these files still have a purpose.
 
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