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I came accross some info that Google's Chrome browser also stores items in the "User/<name>/AppData/Local/Temp/ directory, even when the browser isn't running. Over time, it can add up to LOTS of files.

By definition, anything in a "Temp" directory can be deleted whenever you reboot.

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Tarqelne was looking in the right place: if they're created, they are in

c:\users\your account\appdata\local\temp

So if you are paranoid, by all means keep an eye out, and let me know if you spot these not being cleaned up properly.

Just checked the folder and found just over 92.000 folders with h2hh chat files in them, overall around 2,2 GB. Just indexing and displaying the folders in the Explorer (I'm on Win7 Pro 64bit) took more than 2 minutes.

I've been using H2HH on this machine from the very early versions up to 2.10.0 now, continuously updating when new versions became available (I think I started with some 2.1.x version).

Anyway, while this huge amount of files never really caused any problem for me, it was quite surprising to see this - I'm deleting them as I write this (which takes around 45 minutes).

Just for info, so the "problem" does not seem to be happening for just one user.

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Just to add my 2 cents, been using H2HH since first created years ago on the same Win7 install and have nothing in my temp file (total size is 65mb). But thats because I routinely do system maintenance by using Disk Cleanup in System tools. Problem, if there ever was, is solved.

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Mike, can you confirm that you found the files in AppData/Local/Temp (not some other place that I'm not aware of).

Can you also confirm that after deleting them, and using H2HH 2.11.0, you don't get any more?

I am waiting for this to be confirmed by someone who had the problem, because it will confirm that whatever made it happen in the past appears to have gone away. (Or not, depending on the outcome).

GaJ

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I thought of another question. If someone else finds these, before you delete them could you take a moment to check the creation dates on them? I would like to know if they were created over a period of time, or all suddenly at once, and when this was.

Apologies if this is causing hassles or stress to anyone - I'm sure that H2HH is not the first and won't be the last program to inadvertently

generate a bunch of files/data. In fact, right now, my own AppData/Local/Temp directory has 600M in 1500 files, none of which

came from H2HH. Pretty normal stuff (especially for Windows). But rest assured that with your constructive help I'll make sure that H2HH

doesn't contribute to this un-necessarily.

GaJ

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GAJ - I found 486 of these folders in the cache totalling 17.4 Mb. Unfortunately I deleted them before I read your post - however, I did note that they were all dated 2014.

Now until the end of 2013, I was using a very old version of H2HH ( 1.4.6 ), then I changed to 2.5.4 on 02/01/2014 - but the chat didn't seem to be working with my opponent who told me the current version was 2.10.7, so I then got that version on 09/01/2014.

So it was definitely not happening with 1.4.6, may possibly have begun with 2.5.4, but is certainly happening with 2.10.7

I've just tested by having cache open in Explorer and sending a chat message in H2HH and it generated 2 folders both containing DropboxNSISTools.dll & UAC.dll and 6 folders each with a chat*.h2hh file.

Just opening and closing H2HH generates 4 folders with a chat*.h2hh file ( 2 x 80Kb and 2 x 24Kb - although the size may relate to the amount of chat active ).

Hope this helps.

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Mike, can you confirm that you found the files in AppData/Local/Temp (not some other place that I'm not aware of).

Can you also confirm that after deleting them, and using H2HH 2.11.0, you don't get any more?

I am waiting for this to be confirmed by someone who had the problem, because it will confirm that whatever made it happen in the past appears to have gone away. (Or not, depending on the outcome).

GaJ

I can confirm that I found the folders in AppData/Local/Temp for my current user.

Also, I did a quick test with H2HH 2.10.0 and then 2.11.0.

Sequence of events as follows:

1. Start H2HH, Dropbox is NOT running:

6 Temp folders with .h2hh chat files in them are created in AppData/Local/Temp

2. Start Dropbox:

Another 24 Temp folders with .h2hh chat files in them are created in AppData/Local/Temp

3. Close Dropbox, close H2HH:

Temp folders with files remain in AppData/Local/Temp

After doing the above sequence with H2HH 2.10.0, I installed 2.11.0, deleted all previously created Temp folders in AppData/Local/Temp and repeated the sequence - with the same result - folders were created but not deleted on program termination.

I'm not sure at this point, but both programs seem to be responsible for creation of the folders. Or it could be H2HH, which could be doing something additionally when Dropbox is started (I'm hypothesising from the fact that H2HH on its own, without Dropbox running, is creating temp folders in AppData/Local/Temp)

Hope this helps, but I would like to repeat anyway that this has never caused any problems for me, I was just curious about it. Now that I know, I will look into a way to delete the contents of this temp folder on a regular basis. A script which could execute during shutdown of Windows would be the best solution .. anybody knows if this is possible?

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I'm not a Windows scripting guru, but it is possible to run a Windows script at startup (or shutdown), and it is possible to write a script that deletes the contents of a folder, and any "Temp" folder can have its contents deleted between sessions, so it should certainly be possible.

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Yes - there are indeed a bunch of other folders in there because as I said most applications need a temporary file at some time or other, and that's the standard place to put them.

Some applications are better than others at cleaning these up after themselves. H2HH tries to be clean.

I'm keen to confirm whether or not the H2HH ones you found are from an older version of H2HH that had a bug that we've only just discovered, or whether there's still some way H2HH is not succeding in cleaning up.

Can you delete the existing ones, make sure you are running 2.11.0, and see if anymore come back?

Thanks!

GaJ

GaJ,

Yesterday I deleted the entire temp folder that is being discussed in this thread. Since then, I have sent several H2HH chat messages, and exchanged several PBEM turns via H2HH.

The version of H2HH I currently have installed is 2.11.0.

Just now, I checked that temp folder and found no H2HH folders or any evidence of H2HH chat files.

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Mad Mike, let's get to the bottom of this off line, if you're willing to help me track down the cause of it.

I sounds like the temp files that H2HH is using are not getting deleted properly. In theory, this isn't possible :) But that's just theory.

I'll drop you a PM, we'll see where we get.

GaJ

Sure, happy to help. :)

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I've done a little research into the question of temporary files, and who is responsible for deleting them. Some programming languages, such as Python, have support for creating temporary files that are automatically deleted when the file is closed. However, that requires some cooperation from the operating system to make it happen. Given the number of files that accumulate in the Windows Temp folder, from multiple sources, I suspect that the Windows is probably at least partially to blame for those files and folders living longer than they should.

I would think that there is probably some freeware utility that will do a scheduled cleanup of the Temp directories, possibly built into Windows itself.

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Checked my temp directory and don't have any folders at all in there for H2HH (searched 'H2HH'), unless I'm searching the wrong thing? There's 2.4GB total in 'TEMP'. Checked and I'm using version 2.10.7 of H2HH (which I can't be without now that I'm using it...chat works fine for me). Excellent work GaJ!

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Just to confirm what Mike passed on: with Mike's help I found what was causing these temp files to sometimes appear and this is fixed in H2HH 2.11.2, is available now.

This problem was introduced when I had to update the chat file format, around about 2.8.x

As a result of that change, H2HH got the possibility of becoming confused when encountering chat files from oppos who had not updated, and forgot to delete it's temporary file in that case.

As always - if you spot a problem, let me know.

Cheers,

GaJ

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Note to marka about temporary files: in this instance, the fault was entirely mine - I can't blame Windows, it was just a bug in H2HH.

As you can see by number and range of temp files left in /Temp by all sorts of programs, this is a tricky area to get right in all circumstances. H2HH does its best to be a good citizen and clean up after itself :)

Cheers,

GaJ

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  • 4 years later...

It's been four years since I've been here and I had not realized the reaction produced by my original post. I would like to apologize to GreenasJade and the community for having made him feel that my remarks were inflammatory. I most certainly have appreciated all the work that GreenasJade has done for our community and I personally have benefitted greatly from all the CM mods posted on his website. I realize that his creation of H2HH has also be a boon to the community. I hope that at least you can also understand the distress that I experienced with the bug I encountered. I'm sorry that I did not do a better and more diplomatic job reaching out to the community for a solution. I was in a panic at the time.

Cheers,

 

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