“Temporary Internet Files” in Java Control Panel

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The latest (11/19/2009) edition of the Windows Secrets newsletter has an article “Dumping Java cache improves browser performance”. It describes how to open the Java Control Panel to delete “Temporary Internet Files”. However, the article did not address the warning that appears on the panel: “Only advanced users should delete files or modify these settings.”

So, I’d consider myself somewhat of an “advanced user”, but I’m not comfortable going forward because, apparently, there’s something that an “advanced user” would/should know about deleting “Temporary Internet Files” that non-advanced users don’t, and, as such, would know under what circumstances one shouldn’t delete these files.

I am somewhat surprised to find that the “Amount of disk space to use” is set to “Unlimited” on the Settings tab. However, there’s “only” 28MB of files in the cache.

I searched at sun.com and googled for info on this, but I’m either using the wrong search terms, or there is a dearth of information on the “danger” of deleting these files.

Can anyone chime in?

(FWIW, the About dialog shows “Version 1.5.0 (build 1.5.0_10-b03)”.)

TIA,
Dan

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So, I’d consider myself somewhat of an “advanced user”, but I’m not comfortable going forward because, apparently, there’s something that an “advanced user” would/should know about deleting “Temporary Internet Files” that non-advanced users don’t, and, as such, would know under what circumstances one shouldn’t delete these files.

I have 68 MB of cached files, and the slider is set to 1000MB. I think I can afford to go down to 500MB, or lower, without impacting the normal functioning of Java. I’m comfortable doing that. Not that it will make any practical difference.

However, I don’t know whether I should delete temporary files, because I don’t know whether I depend on any Java applets to store persistent data in the cache. I’m not worried about temporary data because presumably it would have expired and been refreshed eventually.

Sun doesn’t treat it as a big deal in their “how to” article — How do I clear the Java cache? — so perhaps the warning in the dialog is just to reduce support calls.

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I have 68 MB of cached files, and the slider is set to 1000MB. I think I can afford to go down to 500MB, or lower, without impacting the normal functioning of Java. I’m comfortable doing that. Not that it will make any practical difference.

However, I don’t know whether I should delete temporary files, because I don’t know whether I depend on any Java applets to store persistent data in the cache. I’m not worried about temporary data because presumably it would have expired and been refreshed eventually.

Sun doesn’t treat it as a big deal in their “how to” article — How do I clear the Java cache? — so perhaps the warning in the dialog is just to reduce support calls.

Re persistent data: I understand what you’re saying, and I’ve been down this track as well, but I also consider “Temporary Internet Files” to be just that, temporary. Not being a web developer myself, nor very knowledgeable in Java, it is difficult, nay, impossible for me to gauge the effects, both beneficial and detrimental, to pushing the Delete button. The article caught my eye because of potential improved performance of the browser. Firefox is acceptable and, frankly, quite good considering I keep about 80 tabs open between two windows. IE, however, is a total pig, and I’ve caught it draining my system of 25% to 50% of the CPU, even when it was minimized with just 5 tabs open. (I use IE only because this is a work computer for which our intranet sites require IE.)

One thing that surprised me was finding Lotus Notes-related files in the Java cache. One thing I absolutely want to avoid is to hose Notes, since configuring that POS is tedious. If not for the Notes files, I would be less hesitant to push the Delete button.

I saw that Sun article too. Isn’t funny how the panel gives a warning, but there’s no (easy-to-find) information on the rationale behind it?

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FWIW, the About dialog shows “Version 1.5.0 (build 1.5.0_10-b03)”

Unless you have a specific reason to keep version 1.5 you should consider moving to the lates Java version – Java SE Runtime Environment 6u17.

Joe

--Joe

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Unless you have a specific reason to keep version 1.5 you should consider moving to the lates Java version – Java SE Runtime Environment 6u17.

Joe

Employer standard version.

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