Clearing history files

[Barney-R]

Ubuntu 10.10 (Yes, I know. I should upgrade to 12.04, but it's a lot of work transferring everything, and something important usually gets overlooked.)

I'm not some government scientist or best-selling author, but like most people I store personal letters, family photographs and other files on my hard drive that I wouldn't necessarily want a burglar or other unauthorised person to access, so I occasionally use encryption.

The trouble is that practically every application in Ubuntu and Open Office keeps a record of my most recently accessed files.

Encryption is useful, but secrecy is important too. If people don't know a file exists, they don't know to look for it, but these "history" files point straight to them.

When I used Windows (sorry about the language ) most applications could be instructed not to maintain a history file, but this doesn't seem to be the case in most Ubuntu applications or in Open Office.

Is there some way round this problem, short of creating and and then deleting a dozen "dummy" files to cover my tracks any time I've accessed an encrypted file?

[zezak]

Write privacy to bash after that it is easy

[greatsirkain]

maybe install Bleachbit and run it as root

[Barney-R]

zezak - I don't properly understand that. Could you explain exactly what I need to do? I'm still a comparative newbie, especially where terminal commands are concerned.

greatsirkain - I've got Bleachbit installed, but hadn't realised it could do that. I've just had a look, and I see what you mean.

Thanks to both of you.

I won't mark this thread as resolved just yet, but I'm optimistic.

[greatsirkain]

well let me know, I seem to be putting out fires all over the place

[Hagar Delest]

For OpenOffice, see History Master.

[Barney-R]

Hagar Delest - History Master could be just what I need. I've downloaded the HistoryMaster-1.1.1.oxt file and extracted the individual files, but I can't find how to install it. Any suggestions?

(Busy weekend, so I won't be able to check back until Monday or Tuesday.)

[Hagar Delest]

Once downloaded, it should be a kept as a .oxt file. Then add it with the AOO Tools>Extension manager (click the Add button and select that .oxt file).

[Barney-R]

Thanks for the prompt reply, Hagar Delest. I've installed it now, but how do I find it?

Sorry to be a nuisance, but I'm one of those annoying people who just wants to use the computer rather than find out how it works - until I have to.

[Hagar Delest]

Have you tried the help file? The extension has its own section in the AOO help.

You may find a sub-menu in the Tools>Addons menu.