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Is there any way to disable the caching of names of co-called recent documents (Start/Documents)? Every couple of days I dump 100 - 200 files from here. This is a totally worthless feature and I wish I could have the option of turning it off. I tried the registry hack which was supposed to clear this everytime windows was turned off, but it did not work.
Thanks
Dell 8200 P4 512 Ram XP Home
Where are you finding these files?
If you are referring to the list that comes up on the start menu, then right click Start, choose Properties, Choose the Start Menu tab, click the customize button, choose the General tab, in the Programs section set the number of programs to 0 with the arrows.
Jubal,
I don't know what you are looking at, but there is no "general" tab at that location. I do not want to do anything with programs. I only want to disable the function that accumulates the list of recently accessed files that accumulates under Start/Documents aka "Recent Documents". The name of every doc, jpg, gif, exe, etc that was ever opened is stored there until it is dumped.
If nowhere else, there has to be a value somewhere in the registry that will limit or disable this function.
I found this http://support.microsoft.com/default...n-us;Q307875#2
Problem is when I click on "advanced" it just takes me to a Windows Explorer type display.
Maybe it is because I am using the classic display. If I switch off classic view and choose start menu instead (XP view), I can see that the option to display recent documents is switched off. I turned it on and exited. I went back in and turned off and switched back to classic view. The recently viewed documents (all files actually) are still there.
I can't get rid of the things! I can go in and dump them every couple of days, but it is a pain in the a$$.
Does this mean that everyone using XP home, classic view is condemned to have these useless files accumulate in start/documents? What about other people whose set up is similar to mine? Can you turn this function off?
Registry hackers - can you add anything here?
Try here
Putasolutions,
I thought you might have really hit on something here, but none of the settings would work. I tried deleting recent docs, clearing on exit and limiting to three docs. I created the DWORD and modified the value just exactly as shown in the examples. Exited the registry and rebooted. After the computer booted up, the recent docs was exactly the same as before hacking the registry.
This is driving me nuts.
Putasolutions,
Do I ever feel like a fool. Your suggestions did work. I apologize for saying it did not work. If you bring up any of the the links you sent me and look at it, I'll explain my error.
In the middle of the page there is an example. The registry drilling in that example stops at Current Version. However, the actual instructions below the example show to go all the way to Explorer. I edited the user key to clear recent documents when windows exits. I could not edit the system key as Explorer did not exist under policies. The change to the user key did the job. That folder is now cleared when windows exits. Is there any harm done because I could not edit the system key?
This is the second time you helped. Thank you very much. I hope you never stop hanging around VirtualDr.
If you are using XP (XP view) I still do not understand why you did not get two tabs under Customize. I get a General tab and an Advanced tab. However I can see your problem if you are using the classic menu.
I see what happened, if you notice in the screenshot, there is ' ....' after Current Version\, which, for future reference, means that there is something following on but fails to fit within the allotted space.
No, no harm is done by not editing the system key unless you share the computer with another user, and even then it is not harmful. Basically, the document clearance will only apply to you
Glad it's all sorted :D