Today's user-friendly programs and OSs often provide users instant access to recently used data and documents through cached Web pages, type-ahead lists, and most recently used (MRU) lists. All these features are helpful but can consume a great deal of disk space and can become a burden for systems administrators who need to protect users' privacy. When such problems arise, you can use the Perl script CleanCache.pl, which Web Listing 1 (http://www.winscriptingsolutions.com, InstantDoc ID 40232) shows, to clean out many of the most common Windows file caches and MRU lists. (This article assumes that you have a basic understanding of Perl; for more information about that language, see http://www.roth.net/perl.)
Internet Explorer Cache
When you use Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) to surf the Web, IE stores Web pages, graphics, cookies, Java scripts, and other downloaded content on your hard disk in a location known as the IE cache. Subsequent requests for such stored objects don't require you to reconnect to a Web server. Thus, you save connection and download time, especially for large downloadable files. The cache doesn't belong only to IE, however; rather, it belongs to a library known as WinInet.dll. This library provides Web, FTP, and gopher protocol access as well as caching functionality. IE and other applications, such as Microsoft Outlook Express and Windows Media Player (WMP), use the WinInet cache, so the cache can contain interesting data files. To view the list of items in the cache, open the Control Panel Internet Options applet, go to the General tab, and click Settings (under Temporary Internet files). Then, click View Files in the Settings dialog box. . . .
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