Mark writes:

> I experience the "super-hidden" files thing on Win XP Pro SP1.  Content.IE5
>  not visible unless you ask for it by name, despite "Show hidden files and
>  folders" being selected and "Hide protected operating system files"
> unchecked.
>
>  Furthermore, when I use the WE GUI to click into the cache folders below
>  Content.IE5, the Content.IE5 directory entry gets duplicated each time in
>  left-hand tree navigation pane.  After just a little bit of poking around,
I
>  now see "Content.IE5" listed SIX TIMES below "Temporary Internet Files".

Although I hate to agree with Denys, I don't see anything overwhelmingly
nefarious about these super-hidden files. I've tracked down before what's
getting stored there -- and in every case that I've found, it's been
essentially copyrighted material that has been delievered by one of the
streaming media (RealPlayer, Flash, Adobe, Windows Media, QuickTime, etc.).

When streaming video files are delievered to you, they aren't synchronously
locked to the server. Rather, a few seconds of the material is buffered
(stored) on your PC, constantly running a least a few seconds ahead of your
consumption of the streamed video/audio file. But no one wants this buffered
material out in the open, where it can be readily copied without the control
of the original authors; thus this material is put into folders that WE was
purposefully designed not to readily expose to the general public.

A random name is generated for these "invisible" folders and no one other
than the application actually knows the folders' names. Ideally, the
application would remove the folder when it completes its play, but it is my
impression that if it doesn't and the folder is old enough, Windows will
eventually get around to removing itself.

We're going to do the same thing our coming tutorial product. Indeed, we have
to do the same if we are ever going to be able to recruit authors to generate
copyrighted material in our format. Protecting intellectual property in a
digital world, where anything can be copied perfectly at virtually no cost,
is not an easy task.

Wirt Atmar

* To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, *
* etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *