Shoutbox

Hi all,

Recently I've had to System Restore my computer due to major problems.  The chat logs I have so far for January have been misplaced in the October 2005 folders, however they cannot be opened in Notepad as the file type is '.ple' (username@hotmail.com.ple) and I have no idea what program to use to open them, or if there is anything I can do to be able to get them back.

I've tried opening in all programs, such as Internet Explorer, Wordpad, Notepad, and nothing seems to work.

The only solution I can think of would be to undo my last restoration, save the files or upload them, and restore again.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

.ple is the extension for encrypted Messenger Plus! chat logs.
They can only be viewed (and decrypted) with Messenger Plus!.

In order to fix the association between .ple files and Messenger Plus!, the easiest way to solve this is to simply reinstall Messenger Plus!.

(no options, settings or other things will be lost when you simply reinstall Messenger Plus! over an existing installation)

Searching on FILExt for .ple shows that it's a 'Messenger Plus! Encrypted Logfile'

So I'd reccomend reinstalling Messenger Plus and making sure it is the latest version.

Also, it doesn't seem that my log files are .ple? They are .txt?

EDIT: Whoops, too late.

Yes all of my log files are .txt as well besides the January ones.  Messenger Plus had an update and I installed it, and then the January files turned into .ple. 

Try what CookieRevised said and reinstall Messenger Plus! by going to Control Panel > Add/Remove Program and let us know if things improve.

I just reinstalled and the January files are still .ple.

quote:

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Originally posted by koiti
Yes all of my log files are .txt as well besides the January ones.  Messenger Plus had an update and I installed it, and then the January files turned into .ple. 

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Files will never turn suddenly into a certain type when installing software.

If you install Messenger Plus!, it will not, out of the blue, convert unencrypted text logs into encrypted ple files.

quote:

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Originally posted by Chris4
Try what CookieRevised said and reinstall Messenger Plus! by going to Control Panel > Add/Remove Program and let us know if things improve.

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I did NOT suggest to go to add/remove programs. In fact I specifically said: reinstall over the current installation!

I specifically suggested this in that way so he will not loose his current settings. If he first removes Messenger Plus! by going to add/remove programs, chances are (higher) that he also removes his current settings (by accident).

quote:

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Originally posted by koiti
I just reinstalled and the January files are still .ple.

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Because they were encrypted in the first place. As I said, files will not suddenly turn into another file type just by installing something.

If they are .ple files it means you have specifically encrypted them before by enabling the chat encryption in Messenger Plus!. To turn them into readable (in notepad and other text editors) files again, you need to turn off chat encryption.

Plus! > Preferences > Privacy Protection > Passwords > Log Files Encryption

Turning that option off will decrypt all the encrypted chat logs (.ple files) in the main log directory.

I did not remove my Messenger Plus! only reinstalled it, so no worries about that

I tried the encrypting/de-encrypting and that works for the normal txt files that I have. However the .ple files stay the same.  I am thinking, maybe I should have de-encrypted the files before doing the System Restore?

Decrypting and encrypting will only work for files in the main chat log directory. Not for the files which are already archived in the archive (sub)directories.

quote:

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
Plus! > Preferences > Privacy Protection > Passwords > Log Files Encryption

Turning that option off will decrypt all the encrypted chat logs (.ple files) in the main log directory.

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If you whish to encrypt or decrypt files in the archive directories you need to move those specific files to the main directory first (and move them back to the archive folders when you're done).

It doesn't matter if you did that before or after a system restore. System restore has no influence on this matter at all.

The only thing that can have influence on encrypting/decrypting is the password you've set. Make sure it is the correct password for all the encrypted files. As soon as a file is encountered which was encrypted with a different password, the decryption will stop.

I know, I moved those .ple files into the main log directory before I tried encrypting/deencrypting.