History fills up too soon

[Guest]

Hello,

I've often seen IE stop showing newly-visited links as such, and stop adding
URLs to my History file, long before I've told it to stop.

For instance, even if I tell it to keep History for 770 days (110 weeks), it
often stops around 20-25 weeks, as if it's full.

My PC has lots of free hard drive and RAM, so I don't know why this is
happening. (Registry, perhaps?)

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

It can depend on a few things, such as,

1. How much space you have allocated for the History

Tools>Internet Options>General tab
Under Temprary Internet Files
Click Settings
Move the slider for Amount of disk space to use to whatever amount you want
to allocate

2. How many days you have set for it to say the History

Tools>Internet Options>General tab
Under History > Days to keep page in history
Set the number to however many days you want

3. The History folder can become corrupted, thus, it may not hold the
History as it should.

You might need to delete the damaged History folder- a new one will be
created on restart.
http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/delcache.htm

4. Autocomplete may not be working properly:

Autocomplete not working

Addresses Are Not Resolved When the AutoComplete Feature Is Enabled
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q230592#kb1

Work through the possible solutions at
http://www.mvps.org/inetexplorer/answers4.htm#autocomplete

Then see:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1585442,00.asp

and....

Keep in mind that the Auto-Complete feature can be disabled by the webmaster
INFO: Disabling AutoComplete with Internet Information Services and ASP

Hint: View Source for a webpage should reveal the AutoComplete property. If
set to OFF, that site has intentionally turned Off the AutoComplete feature
for security.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/Author/dhtml/reference/
properties/autocomplete.asp

If these steps do not resolve your problem, please post back to this thread
with the details and any error messages.

Hope this helps

Jan
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[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Thank you for your very detailed response.

Please let me try to address your points.

1) I'm not at that PC as I write this, but I think the allocated space for
Temporary Internet Files is around 124MB or so (not sure, but trying to
remember). Still, just in case, I'll be happy to increase it, though, and
see what happens in the coming weeks/months. (I never before considered
Temporary Internet Files and History to be related in this way.)

2) As noted in my original post, the key thing is that the number of days I
show (whether as small as 182 -- 26 weeks -- or as high as 770 -- 110 weeks)
is sometimes not reached before it stops tracking where I go. If I then
(temporarily) reduce it a week at a time, I'll reach a point where the PC
will delete History from long ago, and enable more tracking going forward,
before I then increase it back.

3) I've actually had this issue with my current WinXP machine, as well as,
a few years ago, with my then-Win95 machine. In the Win95 model, clearing
the entire History ("uncorrupting" it?) didn't stop this issue from
re-occurring at some later date...or did you mean doing something else to
uncorrupt it?

4) Not sure I understand how AutoComplete is involved in this.

Also, there are no error messages. I just notice that it's stopped tracking
my History.

Does this clarify what I'm experiencing? If not, please let me know and
I'll do my best to answer you. Thanks again for assisting me!

Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

Dear Jan,

Thank you for your very detailed response.

Please let me try to address your points.

1) I'm not at that PC as I write this, but I think the allocated space for
Temporary Internet Files is around 124MB or so (not sure, but trying to
remember). Still, just in case, I'll be happy to increase it, though, and
see what happens in the coming weeks/months. (I never before considered
Temporary Internet Files and History to be related in this way.)

2) As noted in my original post, the key thing is that the number of days I
show (whether as small as 182 -- 26 weeks -- or as high as 770 -- 110 weeks)
is sometimes not reached before it stops tracking where I go. If I then
(temporarily) reduce it a week at a time, I'll reach a point where the PC
will delete History from long ago, and enable more tracking going forward,
before I then increase it back.

3) I've actually had this issue with my current WinXP machine, as well as,
a few years ago, with my then-Win95 machine. In the Win95 model, clearing
the entire History ("uncorrupting" it?) didn't stop this issue from
re-occurring at some later date...or did you mean doing something else to
uncorrupt it?

You're welcome! This can happen, and is sometimes caused by some types of
spyware or malware which can currupt or damage the index file, which is an
important part of the History. You may want to delete it and let Windows
recreate a new one.

Here is an excellent article that describes the Index.dat file and how to
delete it, as well as information on the rest of the IE Cache and how it
works:

What is the index.dat file:
http://www.purgeie.com/indexdat.htm

Deltree Instructions here:
http://inetexplorer.mvps.org/answers_8.htm#deltree

Location of History or Index.dat files:
http://www.milincorporated.com/a2_index.dat.html

4) Not sure I understand how AutoComplete is involved in this.

AutoComplete is part of the History process, so to speak.
http://www.internetwasher.com/autocomplete.htm

Also, there are no error messages. I just notice that it's stopped tracking
my History.

Does this clarify what I'm experiencing? If not, please let me know and
I'll do my best to answer you. Thanks again for assisting me!

I hope that the information I've provided may be of some help.


Jan
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[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Hello again, and thank you very much.

3) Clearing the History file and starting over is what I did with Win95
when it happened there, and I was hoping to find an alternative that would
work, too. I'll try increasing the Temporary Internet Files size, as you
suggested, and see what happens, though I probably won't know for sure for a
while (days/weeks/months).

4) Thanks for the info about AutoComplete, but I don't think that leads to
anything to resolve this. Yes, I enabled it...long ago...but the page at the
internetwasher link you supplied, while informative, didn't seem (to me) to
offer a solution to this issue.

(Just wondering, as noted in my original e-mail, I thought that maybe...just
maybe...some registry setting might also be at play. Would you {or another
reader} know anything about that?)

Thanks again.

Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

As I said, there are several reasons why a Cache folder can get corrupted or
damaged, and need to be replaced. It is not something you can totally avoid
at some point. You can wait and see what happens in a few weeks or so, but,
wind up having to start all over again. The only thing I can suggest is
that you bakup your History so that you can keep what you have if you have
to delete it. It can go completetly at any time, and then you will have no
choice, and no backup. You can backup your Cookies and Favorites using the
Import/Export Wizard in IE.

I am sorry that I don't know of any quick Registry fix for this problem.
However, perhaps there are others here who may.

Hope this helps

Jan
Smiles are meant to be shared,
that's why they're so contagious.

 

[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Thanks again for your quick response.

"Backup History"? How can that happen and, more importantly, once that's
done, if I then "Clear History", how could I restore that backup and have all
of the information appear as it should (i.e., organized by week and domain,
as usual)?

Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

Dear Jan,

Thanks again for your quick response.

"Backup History"? How can that happen and, more importantly, once that's
done, if I then "Clear History", how could I restore that backup and have all
of the information appear as it should (i.e., organized by week and domain,
as usual)?

Here is what I use. It's Free...and it works very well. It also backs up
other files as well, including Favorites, Cookies, Dialup, AutoComplete,
etc., then you can simply restore it using the same program. You can select
just a single folder to backup from the list if you want. And...you can
even schedule automatic backups. Voila!... ;o)

Backup IE History
http://www.backsettings.com/internet-explorer-backup.html

What I do when it is ready to restore and create a folder or use the old
one, I have it create a new folder using the date the backup was done, such
as BU-12-07-04. It will ask you each time you backup if you want to
remember the folder, and it will overwrite the information that is currently
in that folder with the new data. If you want, you can do this, and you
will only have the current data. However, I keep a separate folder just in
case I need/want to go back further, such as a case where a I want/need to
restore to a prior point. But....that's just my personal preference.

Hope this helps.

Jan
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Please reply to the newsgroup so others may benefit.
Replies are posted only to the newsgroup for the benefit or other readers.

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[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Thanks yet again for your insights.

I'll definitely look into that BackRex software.

For now, though, I first want to try your suggestion of increasing the
Temporary Internet Files size as that seems to be the least "intrusive"
procedure.

Much obliged, and I hope a time will come when I can return the favor.

Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

Dear Jan,

Thanks yet again for your insights.

I'll definitely look into that BackRex software.

For now, though, I first want to try your suggestion of increasing the
Temporary Internet Files size as that seems to be the least "intrusive"
procedure.

Much obliged, and I hope a time will come when I can return the favor.

You're very welcome! If it does not work out to resolve the issue, we'll be
here! <g>

Jan
Smiles are meant to be shared,
that's why they're so contagious.

 

[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Thanks. I just hope Microsoft (or whomever) doesn't decide to purge "old"
posts before I'd need to follow up...

Bram

 

[Jan Il]

Hi Bram

Just start a new thread.....reference the original subject and a few details
and we'll catch up with ya. I keep my own backups.....<vbg>

Jan
Smiles are meant to be shared,
that's why they're so contagious.

 

[Guest]

Dear Jan,

Thanks so much for everything!

Bram

Hi Bram

Just start a new thread.....reference the original subject and a few details
and we'll catch up with ya. I keep my own backups.....<vbg>

Jan
Smiles are meant to be shared,
that's why they're so contagious.