# Document Lists - Can You Clear Them?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 26, 2002, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969 "2002-07-26T17:48:30Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jmpride62](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@jmpride62](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmpride62)\
**Post date:** [July 26, 2002, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969/1 "2002-07-26T17:48:30Z")

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There are several places in the windows environment such as under the “Document” menu and the “File” menu in Windows Media Player where there are list of previously opened files. Can these buggers be cleared? Some of the files don’t even exist anymore so why are they still listed here?

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**Author:** ![JeffB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeffb/32/188_2.png) [@JeffB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JeffB)\
**Post date:** [July 26, 2002, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969/2 "2002-07-26T18:15:43Z")

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There are ways to do it depending on which version of Windows you are on. In Windows 2000, you can clear out the files in the Documents list from the Start menu by going into the Taskbar properties. Click on the Advanced tab, and you’ll see a button to clear out the Documents as well as recently visited websites.

To get rid of the file lists within applications, you’ll need to do that in the application. I don’t know about Windows Media Player, since mine doesn’t show any files. In Word, go to the Tools -\> Options menu. Under the General tab, there is an option for using the recently used file list and how many files to list. If you uncheck it, the files list will be cleared out. Most other applications have something similar.

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**Author:** ![jmpride62](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@jmpride62](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmpride62)\
**Post date:** [July 26, 2002, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969/3 "2002-07-26T19:11:01Z")

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I have ME, but the instructions worked. Thank you very much 🙂  
Now I just need to figure out WMP. It didn’t seem to be similar to the menu in Word.

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**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\
**Post date:** [July 26, 2002, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969/4 "2002-07-26T22:26:42Z")

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Regedit is your friend: the keys are in HKEY\_CURRENT\_USER\Software

Also, some software saves stuff in c:\Program Files, some use c:\windows\Application Data. The best way to find this stuff is use Find Files and search for files modified in the last week.

Media Player keeps a thing called c:\windows\wmplibrary\_v\_0\_12.db - I just delete it because MP automatically adds any played video to this list.

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**Author:** ![cainxinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7bcc69/32.png) [@cainxinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cainxinth)\
**Post date:** [July 27, 2002, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/document-lists-can-you-clear-them/120969/5 "2002-07-27T00:34:00Z")

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for more control over your digital trail you can google for “windows powertoys” and download TweakUI.