NIS - Full System Scan (item count is what?)

I noticed that a full system scan will execute for hours (time varies depending on other activities) and report over 1.2 million items scanned.

My system contains  about 117K files.  In NIS is an item a file?  Why is NIS count 10 times the file count?

Hi desowea,

 

A simplified explanation is that a file is a block of information that usually contains "sub-items" which comprise the the complete file.

 

Norton will scan the individual "items" which comprise a file and therefore will indicate more items scanned than there are total files.

 

[edit: clarified]

 

 

Message Edited by Phil_D on 06-04-2009 05:01 PM

A Full System Scan (at default settings) will scan inside compressed files (zip files, archive files, cab files, etc).  Norton counts each of the individual files inside the compressed file as it scans.  So although the Windows Explorer reports (say) 10 files in a directory, when those 10 compressed files are expanded the total count could be 40000 files.

 

Does this help? 

 

And just to let you know, I have the same type situation on my machine. 1.2M files = 2 hours scan time if nothing else is running.