| Data Destroyer |
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| Section 7: Refining and confirming the purge operation |
After the files to be purged have been specified, clicking on Purge files brings up a confirmation window, such as:
There are seven options:
- Overwrite files even if they are marked as read-only. Files are usually created with the restriction that they cannot be written to, but some are (e.g., files created using an admin account in Windows XP may be read-only for user accounts). If this option is not selected then any read-only files present among the files to be purged will not be purged.
- Overwrite files even if they are system files (i.e., have the 'system' attribute set).
- Overwrite files even if they have 'sensitive' extensions such as .exe (see more on such extensions here).
- Purge only the 'slack area', not the entire file. (This is somewhat technical, and is explained here).
- Suppress the file names in the report and include only the folder names. This is useful if you are purging many files and don't want a long report (it also speeds things up by avoiding writing to the screen). If this option is not selected then all files which are processed will have one line in the report output (unless the report buffer is filled, in which case the report will cease but the purge operation will continue).
- Purge the files but do not delete them. This is useful if you want to check that the files have actually been overwritten (or if you are using a test file repeatedly). If this option is not selected then the purged files will be deleted.
- Delete a folder if the purge operation results in the deletion of all files in that folder. This deletes empty subfolders, but not the top folder specified for the operation. Thus if purging files in many folders with many subfolders it is not necessary to manually delete the empty subfolders, except for the top folder.
Clicking on Yes, purge these files starts the purge. As the operation proceeds the files which have been purged are listed in the report window (or just a dot is displayed for each file if Include only folder names in report has been checked). When file names are displayed the progress of the purge of each file is indicated by a row of digits from 1 to the number of times the purge is performed (a maximum of 9 times).
Upon completion of the operation the purged files are irrecoverable.
Clicking on the Stop button during a purge operation does not always produce an immediate stop; the operation will be terminated when the current purge (e.g., the third of six) of the current file has been completed.
If you close the report window then it can be re-opened by clicking on the Report window button.
The report window is cleared when a new operation is begun.
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