1.78GB file: Simple user interface.txt

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

Hello,

I notice my avast! folder is taking up 1.83GB of disk space. I tracked down the cause as being the “Simple user interface.txt” file in my avast4/DATA/report/ folder in program files, which is 1.78GB.

Can I please ask if is it safe to delete this file periodically? Also, if it is an important file, will it be re-generated as a smaller file if I do delete it?

With thanks,

David

2

Did you enable generation of the report file? Even for OK files?

3

Besides what Vlk´s says, you could disable the ‘append’ feature and just ‘overwrite’ the old one.

4

Thank you Vik and Tech,

I have enabled the overwrite feature so hopefully I will have only one report at a time in future.

I did delete the old report manually, and then ran a virus scan set on “standard” with “scan archives” enabled. The result was interesting: a single scan generated a txt report of 24MB. When I opened up the txt file, I noticed the phrase “File was skipped because of scanner settings” alongside apparently every file on my computer, including system files such as exe, bin, dos, com, plus ordinary data files such as doc, jpg, gif, wmv on my desktop and in all folders.

I wonder if this means that my installation of avast! is not scanning any files at all on my PC when I run a scan, or whether I am misreading the report. I have posted a small section below, but the same phrase is repeated for what looks like all 200,000 files on my PC. The scan itself takes 1 hour 15 minutes to complete. I have Windows ME, and a 1.5 Ghz processor.

Does the code 42016 which appears after each entry have any meaning that might make sense if this?

Thanks,

David

c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\infrared.cnt [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\msnds.cnt [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\nwrpltrm.com [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\cpqndis.dos [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\epndis.dos [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\fjp02i.dos [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\pcsa.exe [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\net.msg [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB\neth.msg [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)
c:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS\INSTALL\NET3.CAB [E] File was skipped because of scanner settings. (42016)

5

Unless you are running a thorough scan (which is usually unnecessary), avast! doesn’t scan all the files - but only those it finds potentially dangerous (infectable).
If you have the “Skipped files” option checked for the report file, even those items are written into the report (even though not scanned). So, I’d probably suggest to uncheck that particular item… it’s not very useful I think.