Where is the "auto complete" history kept 5

[dspare]

Those little fill-in fields on the search engines have an auto-fill capability that I found out how to turn off in MSIE. But I have not found out how to delete all the entries in the auto-fill "dictionary". Is there a way to do that? After a while it pops-up too long a list to be very helpful. I'd like to be able to edit the list too. Sometimes old typos get in there and it would be nice to be able to remove them.

Does anyone know how to do this?

 

[Win98User]

I have no idea if it is editable but you can delete it by;

Tools/Internet Options/Content/Auto Complete

Once there it is all self explanatory.

If I misunderstood what you wanted, I apologise.

Regards.

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

Please allow me to elucidate. If you only want to delete an individual entry from an AutoComplete list rather than deleting the entire list you can do so quite easily. The trick is in knowing how to do so.

When you're on a Web site and are filling in a form, AutoComplete will recognise that you've entered this type of text before and display it's drop down list of entries that you've used before. All you have to do is select the item and press the [Delete] key on your keyboard. Et voila! problem solved.

I don't know of any other way, but there must be a file somewhere with this information. Perhaps we should ask SLICK WILLY. Regards
Phil

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[DelphiAaron]

crustyoldbloke is right but dont select ie(click) the item you want to delete, just put the mouse over the item and press delete.
Anywhere is walking distance if you have the time.

 

[PAndersen]

You will probably find the autocomplete items in the registry at HKEY_USERS\Default\Software\Microsoft\InternetExplorer\TypedURLs
If you have problems to delete them , you can use a freeware program to clear history, e.g. :

http://www.historykill.info/

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

PANDERSON

I don't think you are right since I have a full history in AUTOCOMPLETE for forms and searches etc, yet the location specified in REGEDIT has nothing in it other than (default) and (value not set), therefore it can't be right.
Regards
Phil

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[PAndersen]

Sorry, only parts of autocomplete info is stored as typedUrls. See thread608-135379.

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

This question is so complex that I've had to do some thinking. AUTOCOMPLETE will help with forms, for example if you are required to fill out a box with your postcode; you just double click the blank box and select it from the drop down box. That information is stored within the registry in several places, depending on what programmes you run.

Another part of AUTOCOMPLETE is completion of typed URL's within your web browser. PANDERSON is quite correct, that is also stored within the registry. RECENTDOCS is a key that also contains information of that type, and it can be deleted without any fear, as the system regenerates the key with blank contents.

Now, my handle on this site does NOT exist within the registry of my PC, or anywhere else that is available for viewing, but when I log in by double clicking the blank box, down drops another box with that info, therefore that info is stored by the site I am visiting, or a COOKIE on my PC you may think. Well, I cleared my IE history,all TIF and cookies relating to this site from both locations and, when I came to the log in box, there was my handle. I conclude that the former is more likely.

This now starts to get a little bit weird, because as a test, I have just visited several different sites about as diverse as you can imagine and found info from one site in the history of another site. The sites are in different countries, one is all to do with deafness and related issues, another written jokes, and another was golf. Therefore, there must be some correlation of info between sites (memories of George Orwell's 1984 are in my thoughts).

So let's imagine that I had typed in a word on a site that I regretted afterwards and felt that discovery of that word might lose me my job. I would have to revisit that site and do exactly as I stated in my first post on this subject, i.e. delete it. So if you happened upon this site by accident and you can't remember the address, you would have to look at your history to find it and correct it, or stumble across it again in the same fashion as the first visit.

Sorry to ramble on and be so longwinded, but we have seen so much recently on this site about invasion of privacy by Slick Willy and his cohorts, that I think we have a right to know where information is held.

Regards
Phil

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[PAndersen]

To clear all user's history, you will probably have to delete one or more hidden files, say from
C:\Windows\Profiles\%user%\ApplicationData\Microsoft\InternetExplorer\UserData.
There are many freeware programs which can do the job. Manually, it may be best to start in MS-DOS to secure that the files are not in use, and to remove hidden and system attributes for complete deleting.

 

[dspare]

Thank you all for your input to this. I didn't realize I was opening such a big discussion. At any rate, my problem was solved by the responses that said to move the cursor over the auto-complete value and hit Delete.

As to where this is kept, I am beginning to think that it is kept in different places by different applications or web sites. I guess my question then would be: Why does everyone do it differently and why is it so difficult to find? Talk about Big Brother!!! Is there really someone out there who wants to keep track of each of the millions of people who use the web???

 

[crisc]

Autocomplete fairly well explained here:

http://www.crazytrain.com/writing/autocomplete.html

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

Crisc

Excellent article, have a star. I can't agree with everything the writer says in the article though. For the hell of it, I checked some of the registry locations referred to in the article and mine are ALL blank, yet my autocomplete works very well. Regards
Phil

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