Thank you for giving such quick responses. I'm not sure if I should be responding now or later b'cause I'm hardly awake at present as suggested earlier. Not to mention ages for each page to open or for replies, etc. But I am keen to get your direct responses whilst I can.

How efficient is download.bak? Do you think the problem I or problems jordan2 have had recently could have been avoided? (Dare I ask, have you also read the thread 'What a bummer' which is very much about this issue about LW prefs?)

'A red incomplete file means the file isn't eligable for PFS, but it doesn't necessarily mean LimeWire doesn't recognize the file as incomplete. There are rare cases where LimeWire can detect that a download has become corrupted, and in those cases it will unshare the partial file (making it turn red in the library), but the file will still be correctly listed in the downloads.dat, and LimeWire will remember what it has downloaded for the file.'

Do you consider the file might not necesarily be corrupt (depends upon your definition of corrupt) for it to be listed in Red. I've still been able to download items in red either by using force resume or doing a source for resources & relisting/reselecting the item in the downloads window. Why is it that these items in red start to re-download from scratch & not from where they left off?
"Still looking into solutions for it" refers to a refinement toward maintaining the link b/w download items & their counterparts in the Incomplete folder. Surely there might be a solution to prevent items becoming red in the first place. I realise it's a complex issue when you're downloading from different sources & sometimes LW doesn't recognise one of the sources as being the same (despite it having the same file properties.) Perhaps it has something to do with the grouping concept. After all, even a simple search can end up with files listed that should have been included in a group of other files but isn't.

When you're refering to the OS affecting preferences, I'm guessing that might mean something to do with permissions (& certainly not everybody has permissions set the same way.) I haven't had an issue with permissions for a considerable time (as far as I know). The effects on the prefs for me was only partial but for jordan2 it was a total whitewash of his settings.

I'm not totally clear about the PFS's, (from your post on 11/4/04
"Red rows in the library mean that the file is not shared. For incomplete files, sharing means that the file is eligable for partial file sharing (PFS). A file being shared via PFS will not be found by normal querying methods, but is instead shared only through the "download mesh". When you download a file, you insert yourself into the download mesh. As other clients download a file, they try sources that are advertised in the mesh."

Can you possibly explain a little more about the "download mesh", & how we can maximize our efforts to fully access these files & not have their download percentage ignored at a later time? If I have misunderstood something please tell me.