Hidden Files and Folders / Content.IE5!?!?

[Anne]

Okay so I've lost a crucial document that is VERY important for my business.
I downloaded this file from an email attachment, clicked "open" instead of
"save as"....edited the document in MS WORD, clicked the save icon, and
closed it. Now my document is nowhere to be found, locked away in some crazy
Temp Folder.

A friend advised me to type in the file path for the Content.IE5 folder, as
he said this folder wouldn't show up even if you searched and selected "Show
hidden files and folders". I did this, it opened the folder, which held a
few other folders, all with very few files in them-- though i definitely did
not locate the file I was searching for.

This prompted me to investigate the properties of the main Content.IE5
folder, which said it contained 5,000 files and 19 folders. I cannot imagine
why this would be, why there would be so many folders full of unneccesary
images and files, and I as the computer owner cannot get to them easily. I
am desperate....Windows support won't help me unless I pay them $60.

I tried downloading an attachment again, and viewing the document properties
to locate the filepath -- then typing in the filepath. This helped me to
find about four of the 19 super hidden folders, but my file was not in any of
them. PLEASE HELP ME

 

[Twayne]

Okay so I've lost a crucial document that is VERY important for my
business. I downloaded this file from an email attachment, clicked
"open" instead of "save as"....edited the document in MS WORD,
clicked the save icon, and closed it. Now my document is nowhere to
be found, locked away in some crazy Temp Folder.

A friend advised me to type in the file path for the Content.IE5
folder, as he said this folder wouldn't show up even if you searched
and selected "Show hidden files and folders". I did this, it opened
the folder, which held a few other folders, all with very few files
in them-- though i definitely did not locate the file I was searching
for.

This prompted me to investigate the properties of the main Content.IE5
folder, which said it contained 5,000 files and 19 folders. I cannot
imagine why this would be, why there would be so many folders full of
unneccesary images and files, and I as the computer owner cannot get
to them easily. I am desperate....Windows support won't help me
unless I pay them $60.

I tried downloading an attachment again, and viewing the document
properties to locate the filepath -- then typing in the filepath.
This helped me to find about four of the 19 super hidden folders, but
my file was not in any of them. PLEASE HELP ME

If you still have the e-mail, to two things:
-- Save it to disk
-- Open it for editing.
When you edited and saved it before, you saved it right back to the
temp files where it was originally placed. And that's what the e-mail
is going to think is the attachment now. So if you've screwed that up,
you've lost out for now. But not completely.

Unless you tell it to delete immediately from the Server, it's still
there. You might be able to redownload by one of the following:

If you have webmail, use that; go to your online email at your ISP's
site and get it from there. Send it to yourself so you'll re-receive it
again.


Create a NEW e-mail account in OE on your computer. Make it identical
to the one that currently you use except give it a different name
onscreen. Pop & SMTP settings will be the same; all settings will be
the same. Remember, identical to the one you're using, except a
different name.

Now, read your e-mail. Since no emails will have been marked "read" yet,
and since this is a new account, it will download ALL e-mails to your
e-mail address. None will look like they've been read or be marked as
read.
Find the one with the attachment, SAVE the attachment to disk where
you know you can find it (Desktop is often a handy place temporarily),
and close OE.
If you don't like it on your desktop, figure out where you'd like it
to be stored, and copy it to that location. Editing on the desktop
might fill the desktop with all the temporary files editing creates and
you may not like that. Theoretically they'll all be deleted when you
close Word, but sometimes not. So give it a permanent home if you wish
to.
NOW open the file with Word, if it's a Word file, and do what you
wish with it.

If I were you, I'd go back to OE now but rather than throwing away the
new account you created, just name it as something that makes sense to
you and hang onto it for future use in case you want to use it again for
this purpose. For second and ongoing use, it's a nice, fast, efficient
way to get previously read e-mail to come to you as brand new ones.
E-mail the main in question to yourself and then IMMEDIATELY, before
you can download your mail in that account, switch identities back to
your original one and check the mail so you'll get the one you just sent
to yourself. Now you have a new virgin copy of that email where you
expect to find it. Make an OE folder for it, and store it there.
Then you can switch identities back to the new account again and
delete the rest of the files there. Do NOT just allow them to sit in
the Inbox. If you do want to keep some for some reason, make new
folders in OE and store them there.

It's a lot of words above but really, it's simple to acomplish and not
near as complex as it seems in words. Basically all it amounts to is
creating a new e-mail account for the address you received the
attachment to and Receiving your emails, pick out the one you wan t, and
save it to disk.

HTH,

Twayne`

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Okay so I've lost a crucial document that is VERY important for my
business. I downloaded this file from an email attachment, clicked
"open" instead of "save as"....edited the document in MS WORD,
clicked the save icon, and closed it. Now my document is nowhere
to be found, locked away in some crazy Temp Folder.

A friend advised me to type in the file path for the Content.IE5
folder, as he said this folder wouldn't show up even if you
searched and selected "Show hidden files and folders". I did
this, it opened the folder, which held a few other folders, all
with very few files in them-- though i definitely did not locate
the file I was searching for.

This prompted me to investigate the properties of the main
Content.IE5 folder, which said it contained 5,000 files and 19
folders. I cannot imagine why this would be, why there would be so
many folders full of unneccesary images and files, and I as the
computer owner cannot get to them easily. I am
desperate....Windows support won't help me unless I pay them $60.

I tried downloading an attachment again, and viewing the document
properties to locate the filepath -- then typing in the filepath.
This helped me to find about four of the 19 super hidden folders,
but my file was not in any of them. PLEASE HELP ME

You've learned a lesson I have had to teach several dozen times over the
years...

Before editing a file you receive in an email - save it to a location of
your choosing for safe keeping and open/edit it from that location. Do not
merely open it straight from the email *if* your intention is to edit it.
If you accidentally do open it straight from the attachment on the email -
be sure to immediately use "save as" at least to locate a suitable location
for said file instead of the temporary storage area (cache) that it will use
for it by default.

It is highly unlikley that "windows support" (Microsoft support I assume you
mean) will be able to help you - this is not a case of a flaw in the
operating system or a flaw in the operation of some product you were using -
but a human mistake. You may have well opened said file straight from its
attachment location in the email and may have well edited it several times
and even clicked on "save" several times - but you were saving it to a
location that is clearly shown as temporary. ("Temporary Internet
Files\Content.IE5") This is akin to you writing your important document on
toilet tissue and wondering why it dissolved in water then trying to get
help from the manufacturer of said toilet paper when you realize what
happened.. ;-)

Have you done a thorough search for all *.DOC files on your entire system?
Did you look through the recently opened documents in Microsoft word
itself - to see if it still listed it?

If you have and your file has not shown up (and you have now changed your
system where you can see system and hidden files) or if it did show up in MS
word and could not open from there - then the file is gone - likely long
gone and well overwritten by the many other files that are written to that
folder during the normal use of Internet Explorer, Outlook/Outlook Express
and so on.

 

[Twayne]

You've learned a lesson I have had to teach several dozen times over
the years...

Before editing a file you receive in an email - save it to a location
of your choosing for safe keeping and open/edit it from that
location. Do not merely open it straight from the email *if* your
intention is to edit it. If you accidentally do open it straight from
the attachment on the email - be sure to immediately use "save as" at
least to locate a suitable location for said file instead of the
temporary storage area (cache) that it will use for it by default.

It is highly unlikley that "windows support" (Microsoft support I
assume you mean) will be able to help you - this is not a case of a
flaw in the operating system or a flaw in the operation of some
product you were using - but a human mistake. You may have well
opened said file straight from its attachment location in the email
and may have well edited it several times and even clicked on "save"
several times - but you were saving it to a location that is clearly
shown as temporary. ("Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5") This
is akin to you writing your important document on toilet tissue and
wondering why it dissolved in water then trying to get help from the
manufacturer of said toilet paper when you realize what happened.. ;-)

Have you done a thorough search for all *.DOC files on your entire
system? Did you look through the recently opened documents in
Microsoft word itself - to see if it still listed it?

If you have and your file has not shown up (and you have now changed
your system where you can see system and hidden files) or if it did
show up in MS word and could not open from there - then the file is
gone - likely long gone and well overwritten by the many other files
that are written to that folder during the normal use of Internet
Explorer, Outlook/Outlook Express and so on.

But as long as it hasn't been deleted on the server, it can be
downloaded again.

Twyne`

 

[Anne]

Wow - Thank you guys very much for your help. I'm not sure that creating a
new email account would help, as the problem is not that I've lost the email
with the attachment....but that the finished file, the file that I edited is
lost. The attachment file in the email, is only about halfway done-- not the
completed file. My finished file was edited, then saved....in that crazy
temp folder. I'm not sure why I could never find it. I even located all
the files in the Content.IE5 folder by checking "Do Not Hide Important System
Files and Folders" or somethin to that effect. And even looking through all
of those folders, I still could not locate my file -- even though I saw
things in there from a long time before this file was downloaded and saved.
For the life of me, I do not know why I couldn't find my file.

I have run a million searches, looked in my recent documents on MS Word,
looked in hidden files and folders, even the Content.IE5 and all of its
subfolders and it just isn't there. What a pain .... complete
meltdown.....I'll be up all night re-doing my edits to the document. Why
must everything be so difficult.

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Wow - Thank you guys very much for your help. I'm not sure that
creating a new email account would help, as the problem is not that
I've lost the email with the attachment....but that the finished
file, the file that I edited is lost. The attachment file in the
email, is only about halfway done-- not the completed file. My
finished file was edited, then saved....in that crazy temp folder.
I'm not sure why I could never find it. I even located all the
files in the Content.IE5 folder by checking "Do Not Hide Important
System Files and Folders" or somethin to that effect. And even
looking through all of those folders, I still could not locate my
file -- even though I saw things in there from a long time before
this file was downloaded and saved. For the life of me, I do not
know why I couldn't find my file.

I have run a million searches, looked in my recent documents on MS
Word, looked in hidden files and folders, even the Content.IE5 and
all of its subfolders and it just isn't there. What a pain ....
complete meltdown.....I'll be up all night re-doing my edits to the
document. Why must everything be so difficult.

Someone suggested a new email account?

It's not that this was difficult... You merely needed to save your document
to a location you knew about/could easily get to in the first place. What
you did was akin to throwing something out the window of a speeding vehicle
while blindfolded with the radio turned up full blast and expecting to get
it back later. Sure - you know what highway you were on - but...

From now on - save the attachment and edit the saved copy - not the one in
your email.

 

[Anne]

Yeh thanks. Trust me, I understand what has happened.... I even knew when I
did it .... I knew immediately that I had messed up. I just never imagined
it would be so hard to recover. I always save things, because I know it
downloads them to a temporary folder..... I was rushing, and everything was
hectic....and in clicking the save icon and closing the file I royally
screwed up. I had hope though --- when I found the Content.IE5 folder, when
I found the 19 folders within that Content folder....yeh, I was hopeful that
I would find it in there. But i think it is truly gone, replaced with other
files...who knows why it isn't there. I just don't know why...when I
clicked the save icon...it saved it somewhere, it must have. Did it just get
rid of it?> Replace it with other temp internet downloads, files, and
pictures....I just feel like.....it saved it...somewhere. Didn't it ?

 

[Anteaus]

Get a copy of Altap Salamander (free version will do) set it to show hidden
files, and try its search capability. This may find the file based on a known
item of text it contains, even if Windows Search won't.

http://altap.cz

 

[Twayne]

Well, unless you've shifted it out of the list, Word would have had the
file in its list of recently opened files under the File menu down at
the bottom where it lists the recently used files.
You seem to be saying the original file attachment is still OK in the
email.

The file won't be stored with a recognizable name in the temp files
folders. You could try a search there for *.doc and see what comes up
though.

Otherwise you should probably just start over again and edit the
original from the e-mail and be sure to do a Save-As and put it where
you know where it'll be.

HTH,

Twayne`

 

[Jean Rosenfeld]

I use Microsoft Outlook 2002 on XP pro SP3. Don't know if this applies to
other mail readers or other versions of Windows:

If I open an attachment (say a .doc) file it gets placed, not in Content.IE5
or its subfolders (those contain Internet Explorer downloads) but in

C:\Documents and Settings\my user name\Local Settings\Temporary Internet
Files\OLK101 (the numbers after OLK may vary).

If you can find that folder and you have not cleared your caches, your
edited file might be there. Here's one way:

Easiest way I've found to see the full contents of the temporary internet
files folder is to open diskcleanup (but don't let it clean up). Highlight
temporary intenet files, click view files. That opens Explorer at the
Contents.IE5 folder in single pane view. click the folder icon in the
toolbar to show Explorer in double pane view and you will see all those OLK
folders in the left pane and be able to examine their contents.
For convenience I right dragged the icon from Explorer's toolbar to create a
shortcut on my desktop.

 

[Martin Gerhold]

Jean's solution doesn't work for me - the OLK folders are still invisible!

To repeat my reply in windows.xpgeneral:

A brief experiment on my setup (Outlook, XP-Pro)
reveals that Outlook saves files to the folder "C:\Documents and
Settings\<user>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK771\". However,
Explorer shows no such folder. Agent Ransack (google it) can see files in this
'magic' folder that Explorer can't. Even without Agent Ransack, you may be able
to access the contents: try opening another word doc from within an email, then
go to File>Save As, and save with a recognisable simple name in the offered
folder. Then go to File>Open, and you should see that saved file, and any other
Word files in the 'magic' folder - your 'lost' one may be there.

HTH, Martin

 

[Jean Rosenfeld]

Are you logged in with admin rights? If you right click on the temporary
internet files folder (in the Explorer window got through disk cleanup as
suggested in my previous post) properties, security tab, does your logged in
account have full control? if not see if giving yourself full control there
the OLK folders show up after a refresh of the explorer window.

However, your method also works fine to access at least one of the OLK
folders (I have two at present, not sure why)

Jean's solution doesn't work for me - the OLK folders are still invisible!

To repeat my reply in windows.xpgeneral:

A brief experiment on my setup (Outlook, XP-Pro)
reveals that Outlook saves files to the folder "C:\Documents and
Settings\<user>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK771\".
However,
Explorer shows no such folder. Agent Ransack (google it) can see files in
this
'magic' folder that Explorer can't. Even without Agent Ransack, you may
be able
to access the contents: try opening another word doc from within an email,
then
go to File>Save As, and save with a recognisable simple name in the
offered
folder. Then go to File>Open, and you should see that saved file, and any
other
Word files in the 'magic' folder - your 'lost' one may be there.

HTH, Martin

 

[Martin Gerhold]

No admin rights here - I am on a work PC with very restricted access! I shall
try what you suggest at home... not that I have an problem, I was just trying to
help, and be ready for when a colleague might have the same issue.

Lets hope Anne gets lucky!

Are you logged in with admin rights? If you right click on the temporary
internet files folder (in the Explorer window got through disk cleanup as
suggested in my previous post) properties, security tab, does your logged in
account have full control? if not see if giving yourself full control there
the OLK folders show up after a refresh of the explorer window.

However, your method also works fine to access at least one of the OLK folders
(I have two at present, not sure why)

 

[Charlie Hathaway]

You can get access to your OLK771 folder by using My Computer and go to the
folder C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet
Files which you will be able to see ok. Then in the address bar at the top
of the screen type in the name of your Temporary Outlook folder seperated by
a back slash \OLK771 and press the Enter key and it should open just fine.
Another alternative would be to just type into the address bar
"%USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK771"
Of coarse in your example you must replace the <user> with your User Profile
Name.

Charlie
__________________________________________________________________________________

Jean's solution doesn't work for me - the OLK folders are still invisible!

To repeat my reply in windows.xpgeneral:

A brief experiment on my setup (Outlook, XP-Pro)
reveals that Outlook saves files to the folder "C:\Documents and
Settings\<user>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK771\".
However,
Explorer shows no such folder. Agent Ransack (google it) can see files in
this
'magic' folder that Explorer can't. Even without Agent Ransack, you may
be able
to access the contents: try opening another word doc from within an email,
then
go to File>Save As, and save with a recognisable simple name in the
offered
folder. Then go to File>Open, and you should see that saved file, and any
other
Word files in the 'magic' folder - your 'lost' one may be there.

HTH, Martin

 

[Ragmuffina]

the same happened to me only i've lost coursework due to be sent today. I am
frantically trying to search the internet trying to find a way to access the
files.
;(

 

[Shenan Stanley]

the same happened to me only i've lost coursework due to be sent
today. I am frantically trying to search the internet trying to
find a way to access the files.
;(

Did you read the entire conversation you have responded to?

 

[Invictus]

There has been some bad advice here. I just did the same stupid thing and I
did recover the files.

1. Go to disk clean-up (I assume you will know how to do this, if not, look
it up it is easy)
2. Click on Temporary Internet Files
3. Click on view files (a window should open with the folder Content.IE5
4. In that window go to tools
5. Click Folder options
6. Click on "Show hidden files and folders" and unclick "hide protected
operating system files (Recommended)" you will be prompted warning you that
you shouldn't be looking at system files. click yes.
7. Now the hidden folders will be displayed
8. Sort the folders by date
9. Your file will be in one of the hidden folders that has been modified
since the time you lost your file. There may be a dozen folders to check.
Find the one with your file, open the file, save it somewhere smart.
10. Go back and reclick "hide protected operating system files"

 

[Shenan Stanley]

<another snippage of the entire conversation>
Read it here:
http://groups.google.com/group/micr...ity_admin/browse_frm/thread/3bf74fdf601932ca/

There has been some bad advice here. I just did the same stupid
thing and I did recover the files.

1. Go to disk clean-up (I assume you will know how to do this, if
not, look it up it is easy)
2. Click on Temporary Internet Files
3. Click on view files (a window should open with the folder
Content.IE5
4. In that window go to tools
5. Click Folder options
6. Click on "Show hidden files and folders" and unclick "hide
protected operating system files (Recommended)" you will be
prompted warning you that you shouldn't be looking at system files.
click yes.
7. Now the hidden folders will be displayed
8. Sort the folders by date
9. Your file will be in one of the hidden folders that has been
modified since the time you lost your file. There may be a dozen
folders to check. Find the one with your file, open the file, save
it somewhere smart.
10. Go back and reclick "hide protected operating system files"

Amazingly lucky. Sometimes the folder is gone.

The good advice is *always* save and work from the saved document - not the
one you decided to open from your email attachment directly. Everything
else is a 'maybe' in terms of keeping this from happening again.

Recovery was not an option in this case because they *found* the folder with
everything visible and the document was not there. That's the way it occurs
at least half of the time - if not more.

The good advice is not to let that happen. Make saving first in a proper
location a habit.

 

[Billsebiz]

I found this on WindoesBBS.

"ise2006--I think a program such as SystemSecuritySuite does a better job of
deleting the Content.IE5 files including the contents of the index.dat file
in that folder.
http://www.igorshpak.net/
Check "Temporary" under both My Computer and Internet Explorer columns.

Specific to just seeing the Content.IE5 files, I have the same problem. If
you type C:\Doc..and Setting\user's name\Local Setting\Temporary Internet
Files\Content.IE5 into the Windows Address line and click Enter, you will get
there. I created a shortcut just for this purpose.
There are other ways, but I find this simplest.
"

This works and youcan see and modify the contents of Content.IE5 and all of
the sub-folders.

Good luck!

No admin rights here - I am on a work PC with very restricted access! I shall
try what you suggest at home... not that I have an problem, I was just trying to
help, and be ready for when a colleague might have the same issue.

Lets hope Anne gets lucky!