Is the "Browser Cache " and "Temporary Internet Files", the same thing ?

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Yes.

To keep your cache clean download and run Ccleaner regularly.

Thanks for the reply Ian, I have CCleaner and it cleans up when I shut down my PC.

Yesterday I had trouble accessing my GMail messages and when I checked the GMail Help FAQ's to work out what to do, it suggested clearing out my "Browser cache".

I use Firefox, so I went to Tools> Clear Private Data and cleared the Browser cache and GMail worked OK.

I was trying to work out the relevance of my (emptied every day) Browser cache/Temporary Internet Files and GMail.
The answer (as much in life) continues to elude me.

how do you set ccleaner to clean when pc switches off,i only found option to run when pc starts?

The browser cache or Temporary Internet Files saves all the websites you have visited in anticipation that you will visit them again and the webpages load much quicker from your cache than from the site itself. This is not so important in this age of fast broadband speeds.

I don't see an option to set Ccleaner to run automatically when Windows closes. However, after running Ccleaner it deletes your index.dat files at close and recreates new blank ones at start. To make sure Ccleaner cleans out the Firefox cache: Open Ccleaner, click on 'Cleaner' then click on the 'Applications' tab and make sure Firefox is selected.

Index.dat files are Microsoft's hidden files which record the address of every website you have ever visited. Not such a great thing if you value some privacy.

Of course if you are really paranoid you should know that deleted index.dat files (and all other deleted files) can be recovered. Ccleaner has an option to make this much more difficult, if not impossible.

Here's how:

In Ccleaner (I trust you have the latest version):

Click on 'Options'
Click on 'Settings'
Click on 'Secure Deletion'
Click on 'Secure File Deletion'
Click on the down arrow
Choose from 1, 3, 7 or 35 deletion passes. 35 being most secure of course....you need to be really paranoid for that option and best leave it running overnight, or longer!

If you are interested in this subject then you could consider Windows Washer, which is even better than Ccleaner, very useful if you ever sell or scrap an old computer and don't want others recovering your personal data. Apparently there is a good trade in recovering data from old computers for the purposes of indentity theft.

This post has been edited by Ian FG: May 18 2008, 06:45 AM

Sorry, my mistake.
I have IE Privacy Keeper which cleans at shutdown and CCleaner which I use randomly and for Registry issues.
Thanks for the deep cleansing tip and I have now set up CCleaner to wipe things on startup.

Does this deal with the historical files, or just new ones ?

Sorry Cranfield, I made a mistake, Ccleaner does not delete files previously deleted normally, if that makes sense. It does not clean the unallocated space on your hard drive. For that you need Windows Washer which also deletes what is called 'slack space' which are file fragments. It costs £20.