Does this temp directory exist?

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I have a friend who has an interesting little problem. I am not sure this is the right forum, but I am sure you’ll enlighten me.

He carries a laptop (running Windows XP and Office 97) and connects to his work domain in the normal way, and works at home on things as you do when you are busy and have one of these portable devices.

He was working on a Word document while at work and saved it. When he was at home and looked for the document, he could not find it. He searched through his C: drive in Windows Explorer (with Show all Hidden Files) and there was no sign of it.

The Most Recently Used list in Word shows the document and I was able to open it, so the file does exist on his hard drive. If I looked at the location of the file it led to c:documents and settingsusernamelocal settingstemp. Windows Explorer does not show this temp directory, and the search for the document revealed no such directory either.

In that I can see temp directory all the other files that my friend had lost. I have been able to ‘rescue’ them by opening them from the Most Recently Used list and then saving them into another directory.

But I would like to know what is going on here. Part of the answer, I think, lies in the way the domain administrators have configured the location of My Documents (maybe?). His admin guys had no idea for him.

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It is on my machines, one just needs to “Show hidded and system” files in the Windows Explorer options.

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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Dave, Thanks.

Yes, further looking has shown it to be on my machine too. So why does it not show on his? Yes, I had already done the “Show hidden” so that I could see all before I started the initial searches.

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What about the “Hide Operating system files”?

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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Is he logging on as a member of the administrators group or some other group with lesser permissions?

Joe

--Joe

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It is Windows 2000/XP “feature” to hide important computer files from you, stupid user.

Open My Computer or Windows Explorer. From File menu choose Folder Options. Click View tab.

Then in “Advanced Settings” window select “Show hidden files and folders” and UNCHECK “Hide extensions for known file types” and “Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)”. Confirm your choice. Windows XP only: you can also uncheck “Automatically search for network folders and printers” (it is unnecessary and slows down your browsing) and, if you like to see vertical lines connecting subfolders on the left pane of Windows Explorer, uncheck “Display simple folder view in Explorer’s Folders list” Click Apply, OK

Don’t ask me why your default Temp folder belongs to “protected operating system files”.

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Thank you. I’ll try these when I see him alter this week and will report back

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One other thing you can do is click on “Save as”. This will open a dialog box in the folder where the file is located, enabling you to identify it.

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Thanks for all your ideas and help. I was able to find the files and my friend was much relieved

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