cookies

  • Thread starter Thread starter Roy Colson
  • Start date Start date
R

Roy Colson

looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
 
Roy said:
looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
Click to expand...

I'd like to recommend a program called Cookie Monster mentioned in a recent
post by Norman Nescio:

"There is available a new major version of Cookie Monster. It have a
redesigned interface and add some interesting options to the cookie
management. Also, I want to send a big "thanks!" to all the people that send
me donations, you helped a lot!

This utility is a manager for cookies created by the most usual Windows
browsers: Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Netscape and Opera. It also works with
any Gecko-based browser and most of the browsers based in Internet Explorer.
The program allows you set a list of the cookies you want to preserve and
then delete the remaining ones with a simple mouse click. It also have the
option of detecting the cookies for sites included in favorites/bookmarks."


http://www.ampsoft.net/
 
Roy said:
looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
Click to expand...

For what browser? You're asking for spark plugs and not telling the guy
at the counter what kind of car you're driving.
 
looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
Click to expand...

My recommendation is WinPatrol v.6.0.0.4. It does a great job of
managing cookies, and it will also warn you when your home page and
search page are being changed, when new browser helper objects are
being added, when new tasksare being scheduled, and when new programs
are being added to your startup folder, and then give you the option
of allowing these changes or not. Thus, WinPatrol is a very helpful
addition to your security suite. http://www.winpatrol.com
 
Roy said:
looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
Click to expand...

Mozilla has this feature built right into it:

http://www.mozilla.org

In addition, you're not as likely to get a virus if you use it instead
of IE. That's because of the better default settings for the most part.
 
You probably already have one and don't know it. Irfanview allows you to view cookies in their entirety, and then one click on the (X) "Delete File" button will delete them. You can browse the whole "Cookies" folder with either the arrows (Next file in directory/Previous file in directory) or your mouse wheel if you have Irfanview setup to use the wheel. Works for me. ;)
 
You probably already have one and don't know it.
Irfanview allows you to view cookies in their entirety,
and then one click on the (X) "Delete File" button will delete them.
You can browse the whole "Cookies" folder with either the arrows
(Next file in directory/Previous file in directory) or your mouse wheel
if you have Irfanview setup to use the wheel. Works for me. ;)
Click to expand...

Blimey, so it does! Neat tip, thanks!

Regards,
 
You probably already have one and don't know it. Irfanview allows you to view cookies in their entirety, and then one click on the (X) "Delete File" button will delete them. You can browse the whole "Cookies" folder with either the arrows (Next file in directory/Previous file in directory) or your mouse wheel if you have Irfanview setup to use the wheel. Works for me. ;)
Click to expand...

So it does. Talk about the "Swiss Army Knife" of freeware apps. Whoa.
 
You probably already have one and don't know it. Irfanview
allows you to view cookies in their entirety
Click to expand...

Hadn't thought of that one!! Thanks. Does averything doesn't it!

But when is it going to make my morning cup of coffee and bring it to
me in bed?!?!
 
You're welcome. It wouldn't surprise me if a future version could do that. Irfanview gets my vote as perhaps the most useful freeware of all time. Have you tried the "Right-click on Start button>>Browse with Irfanview" on your TIF folder yet? Talk about things that you've forgotten about. I've seen files there that I never even knew existed. ;)
--
Jack

PJ> Hadn't thought of that one!! Thanks. Does averything doesn't it!

PJ> But when is it going to make my morning cup of coffee and bring it
PJ> to me in bed?!?!
 
I wonder if any of the other image viewers can do the same. Irfanview is much more than a simple image viewer. I still find different functions it can work for, after years of using it.
--
Jack


RR> So it does. Talk about the "Swiss Army Knife" of freeware apps.
RR> Whoa.
 
looking for a program that will allow me to view and delete unwanted
cookies. I am running XP Home.
Click to expand...
Just finished finding the ultimate answer in Spyware Weekly (a great
free newsletter - to subscribe:) http://www.spywareinfo.com/

Kill Those Blasted Index.dat Files

A question people ask me all the time is "Why can't I delete the
'Temporary Internet Files', History or Cookies folders?". The reason
these folders are difficult to delete is because there is one file
being held open in memory, index.dat. A file in use cannot be deleted
so, whenever someone tries to delete those folders, Windows pops up an
obnoxious error about a file being in use.

On a computer with Internet Explorer 4, 5 or 6 installed, the
index.dat file in the "Temporary Internet Files" and Cookies folders
points Windows at the proper files within Internet Explorer's cache
folders so that it can access them faster. The file in the History
folder is a collection of URL entries used for AutoComplete and for
deciding if you already have visited a page being linked on another
page.

The index.dat files in all three locations contain the address of the
web site associated with the file or entry. The file in the History
folder also includes the date and time stamps on which they were last
accessed and how many times you have visited. [reference]

It is possible for someone with access to the computer to piece
together a very detailed log of your web surfing activities using
these index.dat files. Check out this screenshot to see what I mean.

Since Microsoft has embedded their Internet Explorer browser directly
into the operating system itself, the index.dat files are always in
memory. This makes it nearly impossible to delete the folders in
question and clean up computer usage history.

Some people believe there is a conspiracy at M$ headquarters to hide
these files from you and make them impossible to delete. Personally, I
believe it was bad design and poor communications between separate
groups of programmers. Certainly this is not unheard of in Redmond.

Despite Microsoft's bad design (or malicious intent, depending on the
thickness of your tin foil beanie), these files actually can be
deleted using a couple of different methods.

Be aware that you may lose your cookies if you delete the "Temporary
Internet Files" folder and you definitely will lose them if you delete
the cookies folder. If you have cookies you wish to save, before doing
any of this, delete all of your other cookies from the cookies folder,
then use the export wizard to save them. The import/export wizard is
located under Internet Explorer's File menu.

If your computer runs on Windows NT, 2000 or XP, this is very easy.
You simply log out of your normal account and into an account with
administrator privileges. Create a new administrator account from
Control Panel > Users if you have to do so.

Navigate to the folder locations using Windows Explorer and simply
delete them. Since you are not logged into those accounts, Windows is
not using them and they can be deleted normally. The next time you log
on, Windows will try to open the index.dat files, find they are
missing and recreate them and their folders from a default template.

In Windows NT, 2000 and XP, the folders are located in these
locations:
C:\Documents and Settings\[Username]\Cookies\
C:\Documents and Settings\[Username]\Local Settings\History\
C:\Documents and Settings\[Username]\Local Settings\Temporary Internet
Files\Content.IE5\

If your computer runs on Windows 95 and 98, reboot into MS-DOS mode
and run the following commands at the command prompt:

cd windows
deltree /y cookies
deltree /y history
deltree /y tempor~1

If you are unfortunate enough to have Windows ME, you have my deepest
sympathies. Among its other flaws, ME does not allow you to boot
directly into DOS mode. You will have to create a boot floppy and
reboot the computer from that floppy before you can run those
commands. Follow these directions from bootdisk.com to make a boot
disk if you don't have one, then run the same commands above.

The steps above will take care of the infamous index.dat files without
having to download and install third party software. Even if you don't
care about all the web addresses stored in these files, you should
still do this every so often, as the files will just continue to fill
with more and more addresses. Once they reach a certain size, these
files may cause problems with Internet Explorer and cause it to become
unstable.
 
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