Techie help please......

[espressolover]

I just did a search in my files under "adult". I clicked on it and found a zillion cookies.

How do I [1] tell which I want to keep and [2] get them off my hard drive. I've never done anything like this before, so I have no idea. I read a post by someone who had done it to clear space on his drive.

Does anyone know how to help me so I don't muck up my system trying it on my own?

Thanks..........

 

[Bobmi357]

Generally speaking you can always delete a cookie without much of a problem at your local machine. Where the cookies impact is places like here at literotica.

A cookie is a small piece of data, written on your local system by a remote website. Generally they control things like screen formats, passwords/login names, or in the case of Lit, automatically logging you back into the boards so that you don't have to re-logon every time.

Now then if a cookie is missing from your system, its not a big deal, you'll see and run a website in its default mode of operation, and when and if you change those defaults, a new cookie will be written to your system. So delete anything you don't recognise, your pretty much safe.

 

[Weird Harold]

How do I [1] tell which I want to keep and [2] get them off my hard drive. I've never done anything like this before, so I have no idea. I read a post by someone who had done it to clear space on his drive.

As Bobmi said, cookies can be deleted without messing up your system. Youmay find that you have to log into sites that you're normally automatically logged into after you delete the cookies, or your last read pointers are gone at places like Literotica, but there won't be any adverse effects on your system from deleting everything in your "cookies" directory.

A spyware removal program like Adaware or Spybot Search and Destroy (both available through several download sites -- use google to find one) can help you remove cookies that you don't want or need or cookies that are hidden somewhere other than your cookies directory.

In general, if a cooky is named for a site that you recognise -- i.e. Expressolover@literotica.txt -- then it's probably a cookie you want to keep.

If it isn't named for a specific site -- like Sextracker.txt or doubleclick.txt -- then it's probably a spyware cookie that you want to get rid of.

 

[espressolover]

Thank you Weird Harold and Bobmi!
You've been a huge help! I'll try that site, Harold.

 

[geek]

besides deleting cookies that are trecking you this program will help eliminate nasty things such as spyware from your pc..

http://security.kolla.de/index.php?lang=en&page=download

 

[espressolover]

Thank you! I'll try that too.

 

[hotstik69]

If you're using Internet Explorer, just right click on the big blue E on your desktop, then click on properties. You'll see a tab named "Delete cookies", click that to clear most cookies. Also it wouldn't hurt to click on the "Delete files" tab.

Harold, don't mean to dispute you but Adaware doesn't remove cookies. It will remove spyware though, I use it once a week. I also use a program called "Ultra Wincleaner" which I bought at Walmart for like ten bucks. It removes internet junk, cookies, broken shortcuts, and has a registry cleaner. It's pretty easy to use and even helps keep my old piece of junk Compaq running pretty good.I clear my cookies everyday to be on the safe side and to keep from using up disk space.

 

[Wulf7]

Spybot will get rid of most of the more notorious cookie trackers. Be careful though as some cookies you may want to keep, such as password/login info for forums & amazon.com type web sites.

 

[espressolover]

Thanks hotstick69 and Wulf.....
This is very imformative and helpful.

I guess this means I'll have log~in troubles with Lit for like a week, huh? Lol!
Oh well.

 

[stairwaytokevin]

However

. . .

 

[espressolover]

Thanks Kevin.

 

[anders^g]

I just did a search in my files under "adult". I clicked on it and found a zillion cookies.

Personally, I use two programs, "Window Washer" on regular basis to clean cache files and stuff... And "Ad-aware" weekly to ensure that no software has left spyware behind...

 

[Weird Harold]

Harold, don't mean to dispute you but Adaware doesn't remove cookies. It will remove spyware though, I use it once a week.

AdAware won't remove ALL cookies, but it does find and remove "spyware cookies" like Doubleclick and Sextracker leave behind -- i.e. the cookies that should be removed without removing cookies you may want to keep.

 

[anders^g]

Re: However

Deleting cookies won't really free up any disk space unless you have a really really small hard drive.
Any given cookie takes up a neglible amount of space on the drive. Even if you have a zillion, all of them combined would equal a couple of mp3 files.
So if space is the issue, look for bigger files, empty the recycle bin, or by a bigger drive (my personal fav)

Umm... Minimum allocation space sometimes makes a 130byte file use 4kbyte of drivespace

 

[ReadyOne]

Re: Re: Techie help please......

A spyware removal program like Adaware or Spybot Search and Destroy (both available through several download sites -- use google to find one) can help you remove cookies that you don't want or need or cookies that are hidden somewhere other than your cookies directory.
[/B]

Please beware of Adaware. There has been a period of several months (since Christmas) when it was unable to recognize and remove some spyware, and be in fact being successfully attacked by some adware. If you go that way, get the latest and greatest version. Read details at http://www.spywareinfo.com/newsletter/archives/december-2002/12252002.php

The newly re-witten release seems to be back on top of things. http://www.spywareinfo.com/newsletter/archives/feb-2003/5.php#ls

 

[ReadyOne]

I personally have three things going to defend against cookies.

AdSubtact will screen cookies, but I don't depend on it. I do have it suppress third party cookies. http://www.adsubtract.com/pro/features.html

Spybot will find and remove tons of cookies. http://www.spywareinfo.com/downloads.php

IE can also selectivly suppress cookies; you put known "bad" sites on to the restriced site list and suppress cookies from restricted sites. Getting the list of sites (there are hundreds!) is a pain but IE-SPY maintains an excellent list and can automatically add them to the IE list. http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~ehowes/resource.htm#IESPYAD

I've had to move a couple of sites off the IE-SPY list (which is based on advertiser sites) like Yahoo! mail, and I think, Literotica, since they need cookies to work (but are classed as sites that advertise). But my cookie list (shown by AdSubtract) is now staying small.

 

[espressolover]

Thanks all!

 

[D's mariposa]

another cool cookie program...

We've got Cookiewall on this system. I'm not sure where D got it, but what it does is when you log on to a cookie-ed site, it lets you decide what to do with it. You can "always accept", "temporary accept" or "always delete".. Then when you're done online, you open the prgram and delete and or save what you want too. We also run adaware and a firewall all the time.

 

[espressolover]

Wow!
Lots of choices!

Thanks for your help, D's mariposa

 

[Dee Zert~]

Hmmmmmmm....

I always just click tools - internet options - delete cookies (under temp internet files).
Reading thru the replies here, I'm not sure now if that is enough.
Do I need to get one of the cookie removers mentioned?

I wouldn't want anyone borrowing my computer to find out what a pervert I am.

 

[espressolover]

Okay:
I tried to find the option to delete cookies on my system tools and also by right~clicking onto "e" and doing it that way. It seems there are no places to do that on my computer. I use ME.

Any suggestions besides getting Norton Systemworks or one of the spyware setups?

Thanks in advance.....

 

[ReadyOne]

Okay:
I tried to find the option to delete cookies on my system tools and also by right~clicking onto "e" and doing it that way. It seems there are no places to do that on my computer. I use ME.

Any suggestions besides getting Norton Systemworks or one of the spyware setups?

Thanks in advance.....

I don't think you were following the right path to get to the "delete Cookies" button. Open IE, then on the IE tool bar select "Tools" "Internet Options" "Delete Cookies".

The problem with IE "Tools" "Internet Options" "Delete Cookies" is that it wipes out good cookies as well as bad ones. Good ones remember things like where you were reading in a forum or what your amazon.com account number is.

Spy-bot http://www.spywareinfo.com/downloads.php is free unlike Norton System works. I strongly recommend downloading spybot and rerun it every few days.

 

[espressolover]

Thanks, ReadyOne!

 

[espressolover]

*Success*

I went to the spyware download and got the "cookiewall" system.
I can now see when I have new cookies and can destroy or keep at will!

Thanks all for your help, it's much appreciated!