richard_haseltine

I periodically clear out my Temp folder, as it tends to accumulate junk, but the assinine developers of the PSCS activation system have, I gather, used it as a "sneaky" place to hide part of their system, which we all know about (surely someone at Adobe should have seen this as a dumb idea - "How can I automatically delete temp files at startup" used to be a staple of support boards - and shopped elsewhere). Can I, in order to avoid accidents, set this file to read-only (or even hidden and read-only) without killing activation?

I don't know why it's in the temp folder... mine's in the windows\prefetch directory. maybe it creates it there when CS is running? If so, don't clear the temp folder when CS is up.

scott_byer

Even that shouldn't cause an issue, as deleting files that are held open by
a running process doesn't truly delete them - they won't be deleted until
the process closes the file or exits.

You shouldn't need to protect that file at all. If you find that removing
causes glitches with the program, report back here and I'll go bop the heads
of those who put the file there. I agree, /tmp should be /tmp, darnit!

-Scott

richard_haseltine

I'd understood, from earlier posts, that the file was a disguised .dll that was essential to the activation system. I do have another copy (or file with the same name at least), with a code and then .pf added to the name, in my Windows\Prefetch folder. This is with PSCS closed.

I'm not an obsessive clearer of my Temp folder, but it gets cluttered with bits left from unzipping Poser content and the odd uncleared timed backup so I do turf it out from time to time. Some people are (or were, when HDs were smaller) much more inclined to clear it, even at every boot.

scott_byer

The Windows prefetch folder is an OS thing to collect files loaded at boot
in a way that allows for faster reading. You ca clear it, and it will be
reconstructed at next boot.

-Scott

mick_murphy

It's all just a bit odd, not normal programming practice I imagine. I'd be worried about it if I didn't trust Adobe. Surely it must be a .exe file as it shows up twice in Task Manager processes when PS is running. What happens if you end task or delete both. I'm not going to do it despite the temptation. My machine is running smoothly and PSCS flies like a bird.

richard_haseltine

The thread seems, with a lot of help from my asides, to have drifted off to Windows folder structure. My real question is "Is ~e5d141, and particularly the copy in my Temp folder, a required part of the activation system; if it is can I try to protect it from accidental deletion by setting it read only, or will that cause PSCS to think it is not properly activated?"

scott_byer

Yes, we should have set different names for those files.

-Scott

mick_murphy

Personally I doubt that deleting it has an effect. It would be ridiculous if it did. The common wisdom is that you can delete anything in the Temp folder without ill effect and I'm almost sure I cleaned out my Temp folder last week.

OK I'll go first. I'll move it and see what happens. Did it and opened Photoshop with no ill effects. It's just recreated itself. Whew! What a relief. But if my computer blows up, I'll be back.

richard_haseltine

Well, at least if your computer blows up you'll have a fresh 30-day grace period before activating (as long as you hadn't left the CD in the drive on the old system).

Anyway, I'm now reassured, thank you.