PF File Extension

What is the .PF file type?

Most commonly, the .pf filename extension is assigned to prefetch files (.pf) in the Microsoft Windows OS'es (Windows XP and later). Prefetching is a technology of speeding up application startup. When a Windows program (.exe) is launched, the prefetch subsystem provides a pre-made list of essential external resource files (DLL's, configuration and data files, etc.) required by that program, making it load faster.

A .pf file is such a prefetch list in a special binary format. Prefetch files (.pf) use capitalized filenames borrowed from their associated executables and supplemented with hash strings for identification purposes (e.g., "CHROME.EXE-5A1054AF.pf").

Manual deletion of prefetch files (.pf) causes a temporary system slowdown, and the deleted PF files will be re-created. Microsoft Windows automatically does all housekeeping of the prefetch folder ("%SystemRoot%\Prefetch"). Prefetch files (.pf) cannot be natively viewed or opened on Microsoft Windows, although there are third-party tools that address this need.

Besides, the .pf extension can also be used in relation to the PrivateFile/StuffIt Encrypted Compressed Archive (.pf) file type/format. PrivateFile is the name of a discontinued StuffIt-series file encryption utility by the former Alladin Systems (renamed into Allume Systems, acquired by Smith Micro Software in 2005). A .pf file is a compressed and encrypted archive created with the above PrivateFile tool. Decryption and decompression of such .pf files is supported in the StuffIt Expander/StuffIt Deluxe archive management tool for both Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac OS X.

With the Check Point FireWall network security software by Check Point Software Technologies, the .pf extension denotes the Check Point Packet Filter (.pf) file type/format. A .pf file is a compiled security policy rulebase (.w), to be installed as a firewall module for filtering network packets. It is a text-based inspection script in the INSPECT scripting language. Any .pf file can be directly edited in a text editor, although normally such files are GUI-generated.

In the scope of the OpenEdge ABL (formerly, Progress) RDBMS solution by Progress Software Corporation, the .pf extension applied to OpenEdge parameter files. A parameter file (.pf) contains OpenEdge startup parameters, combined in a single file to facilitate launching OpenEdge flexibly in different configurations. Parameter files (.pf) are passed as command-line parameters through the "-pf" key.

With reference to QAD .NET User Interface (UI), a single front-end for the QAD Enterprise Applications business intelligence and management software by QAD Inc., the .pf extension is assigned to QAD .NET UI configuration files (.pf). Such a .pf file is an editable text file with QAD Configurator parameters.

Software to open or convert PF files

Parallels Tools Center

 

StuffIt for Windows

 

VLC media player by VideoLAN

 

Internet Explorer

 

Aladdin StuffIt Expander for Windows 98, 2000, NT, and ME

 

Free File Viewer Pro

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