PC World Plus! (NZ) 2000 December & 2001 January

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Z * Welcome to Encrypted Magic Folders (EMF) Version 00.01.1 Encrypted Magic Folders (EMF) provides automated & transparent encryption. Select folders whose files you want encrypted and EMF not only makes those folders and files completely invisible to others but decrypts and encrypts the files automatically and transparently as you use them. You won't even know you're using encrypted files as EMF does all the work behind the scenes. If you wish you can establish five different accounts so everyone using your computer can create their own invisible folders that only they have access to. If you share your computer or own a laptop you need EMF. Use it to protect files you don't want others to delete, modify, view, or use. If you have a laptop use it to protect files you wouldn't want others to get if, heaven forbid, your laptop gets stolen. Keep your important files safe. Protect them with EMF. * Why Encryption? EMF has a smaller brother called Magic Folders that does everything EMF does except encrypt the files in your hidden folders. (In addition Magic Folder's registration fee is half that of EMF) Do you need the extra protection encryption provides? It depends. Magic Folders does a good job of hiding your folders but the data remains on your disk in its original format. Specialized disk editing software that bypasses the operating system can still find your files and data. In addition, if someone were able to uninstall or disable Magic Folders then your hidden folders would become visible. Encryption protects against this. Because the files in your encrypted folders are encrypted they're protected even if someone uses a disk editing program or defeats EMF. * How Secure is it? EMF's encryption offers good protection and excellent speed. It hasn't been broken yet. It is, as far as we know, exportable. THERE IS NO BACKDOOR. Should you forget your password there is nothing we can do to decrypt your encrypted files. Quite a few people ask us how big EMF's key size is. They've learned from other encryption programs that the bigger the key the stronger the encryption. This really doesn't apply to EMF. We developed our own encryption instead of using a standard because we wanted EMF to be able to decrypt at the byte level. In this way we only need to decrypt/encrypt the data your programs require and not the entire file. In theory, because we decrypt at the byte level, the biggest key we could use would be 8 bits - which is a joke. So instead of decrypting every hunk of data using the same key, as most other encryption programs do, we developed an algorithm to vary the key based on the data's location within the file. In this way we get both high security and high speed. Having said that, truth is, most encryption isn't "cracked" by breaking the algorithm, it's done by guessing the password. Brute guessing of passwords tends to level the playing field tremendously. We actually have an advantage because we aren't an established standard. Because we're small and relatively obscure chances are no one will take the effort to write a password guessing program (which incidentally would violate copyright and intellectual property laws.) Even if someone were to go thru all this effort we could easily change the encryption method for the next update. If we used an established encryption method like DES or Blowfish then your files would probably have to be fully decrypted when opened, would exist on disk as unencrypted while you're using them, and then would need to be encrypted when closed. This has multiple disadvantages. First, if your computer shuts down while you have "encrypted" files open, then those files would be unencrypted. This doesn't happen with EMF as your encrypted files are always encrypted as stored on disk. The second disadvantage is that it slows things down tremendously. As an example, let's say you retrieve your email and your email program needs to add today's message to the end of your 3MB email file. If we used a standard encryption method requiring the decryption of the file before use then the entire 3 MB file would have to be decrypted, your 300 byte message added to the end and then the entire file encrypted again. With EMF, no decryption would need to take place, and the only data needing encryption would be the 300 byte message. MUCH faster. Around 20,000 times faster in this example! If you still think you'd like to see us use a standard encryption method like DES or Blowfish, or have any other suggestions, let us know and we will consider your input in future updates. * System Requirements EMF requires Windows 95/98. (It works with FAT16 and FAT32) Although it will hide your folders in Win 3.1 and DOS, Auto-Cryption (the automatic decryption and encryption of files in your encrypted folders) will not work unless you are in Windows 95/98. In addition, EMF will not hide your folders/files in 32 bit file access in Windows for Workgroups or Windows NT. It's not for use on shared LAN drives. * Copyright and License EMF (tm) is copyrighted 1997 by RSE Incorporated. Parts of the program are proprietary. Do not use the software unless you agree NOT to unassemble, disassemble, reverse engineer or use any other means to examine or modify the code of any of its files including MAGIC.EXE, DISABLE.COM, DECRYPT.EXE, PW.EXE, TB.EXE and MF.EXE. "Encrypted Magic Folders" is licensed "As is" without any express or implied warranties whatsoever. In no event shall RSE Inc. be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including without limitation, special, incidental, consequential or other damages. Your rights may vary based on your state's laws. By choosing to install "Encrypted Magic Folders" you signal that you understand and agree to abide by the above. * How much? EMF is shareware. You're freely given this copy in order to evaluate it. If after a 30 day evaluation period you decide to continue using EMF then you must become a registered user. You can register instantly by modem (select "Register Now" under the "Registration" menu) or by sending the registration fee of $59 plus $2 shipping ($5 overseas) to: EMF Registration Mastercard or Visa customers: 6373 Villier http://www.pc-magic.com/register.htm Nine Mile Falls, WA 99026 E-mail: register@pc-magic.com USA Fax: 630-214-6697 Make check in US funds drawn on a US or Canadian bank payable to RSE. You're encouraged to freely distribute copies of EMF.ZIP as long as you don't modify the files in any way. DO NOT distribute the individual, extracted, files; only EMF.ZIP. As a registered user you'll receive these additional benefits: 1. No more annoying messages (and delays) asking you to register. 2. The latest version of EMF. 3. Free updates for 6 months (If you download them) 4. The latest full function evaluation versions of our other shareware including our popular "Remind Me!" programs. 5. Technical support 6. A sincere "Thank you" for supporting our efforts to develop quality software and offer it at reasonable prices. Site licenses are available, as well as quantity discounts. Send email to info@pc-magic.com for details. If for some reason you decide not to register EMF please send us e- mail and let us know why. We're always trying to improve our products. * Installation If you haven't already installed EMF you need to do so now. Run "INSTALL.EXE" from within Windows. * Disk compression software If you have disk compression software like Stacker or DoubleDisk make sure that the line in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file that runs EMF (MF.EXE, or whatever you renamed it during installation) occurs AFTER the line that loads your disk compression program. * Selecting your magic folders Magic folders are folders you want to make invisible. You designate which folders you want to be magic folders by selecting the "Add" button at the top of the screen. Click on the desired folder and then on "Hide" if you just want to hide it but not encrypt it, or "Hide and Encrypt" if that is your choice. EMF not only makes the files in your magic folders invisible it also makes any sub folders invisible too. The same holds true for encryption. For example, if you designate "C:\TAXES" as a hidden/encrypted folder then all the files in "C:\TAXES\BUSINESS" would be hidden and encrypted too. * Hiding System Folders We got a lot of requests to allow EMF to hide folders normally hidden from the user with the System attribute. In this way you can hide folders such as your "Favorites" list in NetScape and IE4. So reluctantly I agreed. However keep in mind that we can only hide the files, we can't control how programs, or Windows, will react when it can't find your hidden files. All sorts of serious trouble could occur. If you encounter any problems at all with EMF and you have hidden System folders (EMF will let you know with a warning when you attempt to add a System folder to your hidden folder list) then remove the System folders and see if the problem goes away. * Making your magic folders invisible Your magic folders are invisible from the time you start your computer until the time your computer is turned off unless you deliberately make them visible as explained below. * Making your magic folders visible To make your magic folders visible run EMF (in the Accessories group, or by pressing the hot-key you established during installation), enter your password, and then select "Make Folders Visible". This gives you instant, complete, and normal access to all your files, including the files in your magic folders. As a shortcut you can just enter your password and click on the yellow folder button on the password screen. This will grant you access without taking you into the full program. It also puts and icon on the taskbar that you can click to instantly hide your folders without having to start EMF again. In the Properties menu you can set "PW 'Enter' as icon" to make pressing Enter after your password act the same as clicking on the yellow icon. Likewise, to make your magic folders invisible again just run Magic Folders, enter your password and select "Make Folders Invisible" or use the shortcut and just click on the "Please enter your password" message when prompted for your password. Your magic folders also become invisible again if your re-boot or turn off your computer. All the folders/files on your list become visible/invisible when you select "Make Visible" or "Make Invisible". You don't need to select the folders you want each time you enter your password. If you only want certain folders to be visible on your list to be visible and not all of them (and vice versa) then create seperate accounts with each subset belonging to a different account and password. * PW.EXE Note: PW.EXE works only inside a DOS window, it does not work when you boot to DOS. If you put the PW.EXE file in your \WINDOWS directory then you can enter your password from the DOS prompt just by enter "pw". Although I can't imagine how you would use it - a couple of users have asked that we let them enter the password from a command line. You can use PW.EXE to do this by appending your password after the "pw". For example if your password is "hello" you could enter "pw hello" at the DOS prompt and it would grant you access without you having to physically type in your password. If so inclined you could put the "pw hello" in a batch file so that access is granted anytime the batch file is run. We have also been asked to add a command line option that would let you enter your password AND disable Auto-Cryption. This would be useful for making your files visible for a backup but leaving them encrypted so the backup copy is of the encrypted files. Simply append a " /x" to your password to invoke this option. In other words entering "pw hello /x" would enter the password as "hello" and disable Auto-Cryption - if the password is correct. * Special Functions Selecting "Functions" from the top menu lets you change your password, switch to another account (if you know its password), and remove your account. The Master Account can also change EMF's hot- key, make a new KeyDisk, create new accounts and un-install EMF. * AutoStart You can use EMF to control access to your computer by having EMF ask for a password during boot-up. In this "AutoStart" mode, EMF gets your password, makes your magic folders visible and then exits. You have two options when installing AutoStart. Both deal with how incorrect passwords are handled. The first option lets you attempt to enter the password just once. If incorrect then the user is granted access to the computer but all magic folders remain invisible. The second option lets you attempt to enter the password three times. After three tries the computer is shut down. In other words, only those with Magic Folder accounts will have access to the computer. In both options AutoStart looks for your KeyDisk if the password is not valid. Therefore you can still use the KeyDisk to gain access should you forget your password. And as always, you can use DISABLE on the KeyDisk to uninstall EMF should you not be able to access EMF within Windows. AutoStart just makes your magic folders visible. You still run EMF (in the Accessories group) to modify your magic folder list and all other Magic Folder functions. Enable or disable AutoStart using the "Properties" menu. * Multiple Accounts EMF lets you create up to five different accounts, each of whose magic folders are invisible to the others. In this way each user of your computer, or member of the family, can have their own magic folders. You could also use this feature to group similar files together so that working on one group doesn't expose the others. For example, one account for financial data, one for business, one for personal documents, etc.. Only one account's magic folders can be visible at a time. In other words when someone successfully enters their password, all magic folders are made invisible. If that person exits by selecting "Make Folders Invisible" then all magic folders remain invisible. If they exit with "Make Folders Visible" then only their folders become visible, all others remain invisible. For example if you make your folders visible, and your son comes along and uses EMF to make his folders visible, then yours become invisible. If you create multiple accounts you can't make all files on the computer visible at one time without uninstalling EMF. Remember this when making backups. It also means you don't want to make multiple accounts if you have a disk fix or defragmenting utility that reports more errors when folders are invisible than when they're visible (see WARNING section below). Only the master account can create new accounts. This doesn't mean however that the master account has access to all accounts. Each account can change its password. Let's say you want to give your spouse a private account. You'd select "Functions" then "Create New Account" and enter the new account password as requested. You would then tell your spouse the password you used to establish the account and they would run EMF using that password, select "Functions", and select "Change Your Password". Now they have their own account, with a password only they know. Unlike the master account which can use the KeyDisk to get access should the password be forgotten there is no way another account can make their magic folders visible if they forget their password - other than uninstalling EMF. Don't forget your password(s)! * Scrambled Filenames Filename Scrambling renames the files in your hidden folders to something non-descript when your folders are hidden. For example, 95BIZTAX.DAT might become ZBAAafA.~^A. The benefit is that if someone were to disable EMF the names of your files would give no clue as to their contents. Unlike file encryption, the unscrambling of filenames does not occur as you use each file but is done all at once when you enter your password. Likewise filename scrambling is done when you hide your folders, shut down, or enter another password. This means you must wait during these events while the filenames in all your encrypted folders are scrambled or unscrambled. It also means that if you turn off the computer (without using Shutdown) while your folders are visible then your filenames won't be scrambled. You can enable Scrambling for some or all of your hidden, encrypted folders. Note1: Filenames in excess of 190 characters will not be scrambled. Note2: For files that have long filenames the long filename will be restored but there is no guarantee that the short filename alias will be the same. For example, if you have a file called "95 Business Taxes.DAT" that has an alias of "95BUST~3.DAT", then the long filename of "95 Business Taxes.DAT" will always be restored but the alias "95BUST~3.DAT" may not be, as Win95/98 automatically generates an alias of its choosing when the file is renamed. Note3: On some systems (depending on disk size, FAT type, partition size, and cluster size) the operating system slows down significantly when unscrambling folders with a lot of files. You may want to spread files over several directories. On one test we calculated the time it would take to scramble 1000 filenames. When all the files were in one directory it took a whopping 31 seconds. When spit into 2 directories (of 500 files each) it took 16 seconds. And when split into 4 directories (of 250 files each) it only took 9 seconds. All for the same number of files. * WARNING If you use a disk fix or defrag utility other than SCANDISK, DEFRAG, Norton Disk Doctor, or Norton Speed Disk then you MUST test them to see if they are safe to use with EMF. The danger is that they may see the space allocated to your invisible files (including your password info) and free it thereby deleting all your invisible folders and files. With over 150,000 people trying EMF and Magic Folders the only disk utility we've heard of that becomes confused is CHKDSK.EXE which is why we disable it so it won't run when EMF is installed (as long as it is named CHKDSK.EXE). There are situations where you may need to copy or access CHKDSK. For example, Win95/98 puts CHKDSK on the bootable recovery disk it creates. For this reason you can disable CHKDSK protection in the "Properties" menu thereby making CHKDSK temporarily accessible. To test your utilities (if not listed above) : Run your disk fix or defragmenting utilities when your Magic folders are visible and invisible. DO NOT FIX ANY ERRORS THEY MAY REPORT. If more errors are reported when your folders are invisible then do one of the following: 1. Remove the utilities (so you can't use them) or remove EMF. 2. Use only one account in EMF (just use the Master Account already created) and move the offending utility into one of your invisible folders. That way it can only be used when all folders and files are visible, and thereby safe. If the errors reported are the same when your magic folders are hidden as they are when magic folders are visible then you can use the utility without concern. If you find an offending utility PLEASE send the results of your testing to support@pc-magic.com For those interested in the technical details, this is why CHKDSK (and maybe others) get confused. Disk fix and defragmenting utilities bypass the operating system and directly examine your disk. In this way they can see the space allocated for your invisible files. Instead of directly examining the disk to see which files belong to this allocated space (as smart utilities do) they instead ask the operating system. Since the operating system doesn't see your magic folders when they're invisible these utilities assume the space allocated to your invisible files should be freed. Freeing this space will obviously delete your invisible files and folders. On the other hand if you don't create any additional Magic Folder accounts except for the Master Account created during installation then you can put the offending utility into one of your magic folders. In that way it can only be run when all folders and files are visible to the operating system. WARNING TOO! DON'T hide folders that contain critical system files. By default your folders are invisible until you use EMF to designate them as visible. If Windows needs a file that exists only in one of your hidden folders then it won't be able to find it until you make the folders visible. If you accidentally hide important system files then you'll need to run DISABLE on your KeyDisk to uninstall EMF and then re-install it. See "Problems?" below. * Things to remember Moving files out of an encrypted folder: Files in encrypted folders are encrypted only while they reside in the encrypted folder. For example, if you make your folders visible and then copy a file from an encrypted folder to a normal folder the destination file will be decrypted because it's not in an encrypted folder. The only exception are files moved to the Recycle Bin (or Norton's Protected Recycle Bin) as a result of being deleted from an encrypted folder. These files are not decypted when moved to the recycle bin. In other words encrypted files deleted from within an encrypted folder will also be encrypted in the Recycle Bin. Backups: Some backup programs won't backup your magic folders unless they are visible. Remember, if you have multiple accounts you can't make all files visible at once, you can only make the magic folders of one account visible at a time. Because files are only encrypted within an encrypted folder, copying a file from an encrypted folder to an unencrypted folder decrypts the file. This is true for backups as well. You can get around this by disabling "Auto-Cryption" from within the "Properties" menu. This temporarily disables the automatic decryption of your encrypted files thereby allowing your backup program to copy them to your backup disk without EMF automatically decrypting them first. You can also use this function to verify that files in your encrypted folders are really encrypted. You can also use PW.EXE to enter your password and disable Auto- Cryption from DOS or a batch file in preparation for doing a backup. See the PW.EXE section above. Networks: Do not use EMF on a file server for a LAN. The files in your encrypted folders will always be encrypted of course but the LAN will be able to see your hidden folders. However, EMF works great protecting files on your local workstation's drives that are not accessible to the LAN. "Boot to DOS": If you exit by booting to DOS the visibility of your magic folders remains the same in DOS as they were when you exited Win95/98 but the files in your encrypted folders won't decrypt as you use them. Shortcut: If you've made your magic folders visible and you want to make them invisible again, just start EMF and click on the "Please enter your password" message. Another Shortcut: You can just enter your password and click on the yellow folder button on the password screen. This will grant you access without taking you into the full program. Another Shortcut: If you exit EMF by clicking on the yellow folder button on the Main Screen, then not only will your magic folders be visible, but the "Hide M-folders" icon will appear on the Task Bar. You need only click on this "Hide M-folders" icon and your magic folders will be instantly hidden. Notice that the "Hide M-folders" description only appears for 5 seconds and then disappears leaving no evidence that EMF is present. Changing the Hot-Key: If Windows doesn't honor our request to establish a hot-key (or change it using "Change HotKey" in the Functions menu) then you'll need to do it manually: Right click on "Start" Click on "Open" Double click on the "Programs" folder Double click on the "Accessories" folder Right click on the Encrypted Magic Folders icon Select "Properties" Click on the "Shortcut" tab Change the "Shortcut key" Click on "OK" to finish * Making EMF tougher to defeat Note: As there are multiple options, please read this whole section before making a decision as to what, if any, method you will implement. EMF does a great job of keeping your files protected and invisible if its loaded and running. If no one knows EMF is running then they won't have any reason to defeat it. EMF is totally transparent to the non-authorized user . If we broadcast the fact EMF is protecting your files then a nosey user could try to disable it. This isn't as much of a concern with EMF as it is with Magic Folders because even if someone disables EMF and your files become visible your encrypted files still remain encrypted. However, if you wish, there are things you can do to make EMF more difficult to defeat. During installation MF.EXE is renamed to the new name you give it. You can make multiple copies of this renamed file, giving each copy a different name, putting them in different directories, and running each of the different copies from within your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. Someone would then have to remove all references to the renamed EMF files in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file before EMF would be defeated. Don't worry about loading Magic Folders multiple times as it only loads itself once regardless of how many times it is run. You can also use this "multiple load using different names" method in the SYSTEM.INI file. Look for the section "[386Enh]" and add a line underneath it that says "device=" followed by the full pathname of the renamed MF.EXE file. For example, if during installation you rename EMF to SYS_MGR, and the Encrypted Magic Folders files are in C:\MF, then you would add the line: "device=c:\mf\sys_mgr.exe". You can also use REGEDIT.EXE to modify the registry files. If you don't know what the Registry is or how to use RegEdit, or you don't understand the following directions, then DON'T try this. DO NOT ask us for help if you mess up your registry. Microsoft technical support won't even take calls on the registry. You're on your own. Windows 95/98 depends heavily on the registry so ALWAYS backup the registry files (SYSTEM.DAT SYSTEM.DA0 USER.DAT USER.DA0) to a floppy before modifying the registry. Use REGEDIT to hi-lite the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/System/CurrentControlSet/Services/VXD key. Making sure you've selected the "VXD" key select "Edit" then "New" then "Key" and enter whatever you want the key to be named. Double click on your new key to open it. Then select "Edit", "New", and "String Value" and enter "StaticVxD". Then double click on the "StaticVxD" and enter the full pathname of the renamed MF.EXE file. Since most people aren't stupid enough to mess with the Registry, and you're hiding the purpose of this key fairly well, this is a fairly secure method of assuring that EMF runs whenever Windows 95/98 does. Note: Win95/98 Safe Mode doesn't use the registry, but EMF uses another method to load in Safe Mode. You can protect against someone booting from a floppy system disk by having your BIOS boot only from C: drive and then password protect access to your BIOS. Then if you need to boot from A: you enter the password to modify your BIOS, change the BIOS to allow booting from A:, and then reboot with the system disk in A:. Not all BIOS can be password protected. If you don't understand this paragraph then don't do it. You really don't want to get locked out of your BIOS. If you decide to load EMF using any of these methods keep in mind that using the "Uninstall" Utility within EMF (or DISABLE on your KeyDisk) only un-installs the initial copy of EMF. You'll need to manually remove all other references to the renamed MF.EXE file in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file (and SYSTEM.INI and Registry if appropriate). * Uninstalling EMF You can uninstall EMF using the "Uninstall" function within the "Fuctions" menu inside EMF or by using DISABLE on your KeyDisk. If you have multiple accounts with encrypted folders then you'll need to go to each account and use the "Remove this account" function in "Functions" to remove each encrypted account before uninstalling. If you orphan any encrypted files (this could happen if you have multiple accounts with encrypted folders and you use DISABLE to uninstall) then run "DECRYPT.EXE" to decrypt them. If you've done any of the things described in the previous section to make EMF harder to defeat then you'll need to undo those things manually - EMF does not undo them for you automatically. * FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) "What is DECRYPT.EXE for?" To decrypt any encrypted files that may be stranded after an uninstall. See the previous section for details. "Sometimes after making my magic folders invisible they still show up in directory listings, even tho I can't access them or their files. Why?" Many programs keep their directory listings in memory. So if you have the program do a directory search before hiding your folders the program will continue to use the old directory information even after you hide your folders. Explorer does this. To make matters even more complicated sometimes programs won't refresh their listings even when told to do so. This is probably because Windows notices nothing has changed in the disk cache so it feeds the same directory information as it did previously. In the properties menu select "Update Explorer" and "Write to Folders" and see if that does the trick. In some cases you can't even force the program to update it's listings. For example, we did some tests hiding the "Documents" System folder. Sometimes it would accurately reflect whether it was hidden or not, but sometimes it wouldn't. It would show the list of documents when they were hidden (although clicking on the document wouldn't work) and sometimes it wouldn't show the document list even tho it was visible - and we couldn't find any way to force it to update it's listing. We can only hide/un-hide the files. We can't control how programs react to this. "Sometimes icons on my desktop that point to hidden folders don't look right, even when the folders are visible.". In the Properties menu select "Update Desktop". EMF will then tell the desktop to update everytime the status of your hidden files/folders changes. "I'm having problems with my disk compression software" Check the AUTOEXEC.BAT file and make sure the line that runs MF.EXE (or whatever you renamed it during installation) is being run AFTER the line that loads your disk compression software (Stacker, DoubleDisk, etc..). "I forgot my password. What now?" Master Account: Put your KeyDisk in the appropriate floppy drive. Run EMF and attempt to enter a password three times. After the third attempt EMF will attempt to read your Password from your KeyDisk. "Can I use EMF to encrypt files to be shared with others?" EMF is not meant to be used this way. There are a multitude of programs that do this well. EMF is used only to protect sensitive data and programs on your computer. But if you must, you can disable "Auto-Cryption" in the "Properties" section and copy the desired encrypted file from your encrypted folder over to a non-encrypted folder. The file will remain encrypted because you have temporarily disabled Auto-Cryption. The end user can then use DECRYPT.EXE to decrypt the file, which of course requires knowing your password. Other Accounts: You'll need to have the Master Account uninstall EMF, re- install it, and then re-create a new account for you. If neither of these work then use DISABLE on your KeyDisk to uninstall EMF. Then re-install it if you wish. "I want to un-install EMF but I forgot my password so I can't use the EMF Uninstall function. What now?" Uninstall using DISABLE on your KeyDisk. If that doesn't work then manually uninstall. See the Uninstall section above. "I registered but EMF is still asking me to register." Make sure EMF.SYS is in the same directory as MAGIC.EXE. EMF.SYS is for your use only and has been customized with your personal information. Giving or selling it to others is in violation of copyright law. If EMF.SYS isn't in the directory with MAGIC.EXE then EMF won't act registered. If you registered via modem then EMF.SYS was downloaded and installed automatically, otherwise it's on the disk we sent when you registered. For more information select "About your registration" under the "Registration" menu. Make a backup copy of EMF.SYS as there is a $5 charge if you lose it and we need to create a new one for you. "I can't rename the parent folder of a magic folder when it's invisible." That's correct. EMF doesn't mark your folders with a special secret sign to indicate they're magic folders. It just uses the list of magic folders you create. If someone renamed the parent directory of a magic folder then that folder would no longer match the list of magic folders and would therefore become visible. * Technical Support NOTE: If you have hidden System folders then remove them from your list and see if the problem persists before you contact us for help. In addition, read this Help file (particularly the FAQ section) before contacting us. We are a small shop. We would rather spend our time improving our products than answering questions already addressed in the DOCS. We prefer to offer technical support thru email. It's easier to reach us that way (as we're out of the office a lot) and you receive written instructions to help resolve your problem. All users can contact us via e-mail: support@pc-magic.com * Latest Version You can always find the latest versions of all our software on our WEB page at: http://www.pc-magic.com Thank you for taking a look at EMF. Hope you find it worthy of your support.