Hi gizmola,
Thank you for taking time to reply. I appreciate your expertise with this subject. I'm a bit like a programming sheriff: trust noone and nothing / suspect everything. I don't even trust my own code. i use a counter in my foreach loops to be certain that they cannot become infinite loops via tampering:
$count = 0; $maxentries = 100;
++$count; if ($count === $maxentries) { //i said 100 so why is this still going? exit now }
i have designed my site to detect as many errors as possible. if file exists, if function exists, if isset everything. I don't want to help a hacker wreck my site. No stepping stones from me. I look at everything and question everything. In this case, i was startled by the history of background image names in the idb file like a fingerprint.
Your explanation is most helpful to me. I am comfortable with this info. I've retained update as it is the best option. I can only do so much anyway. Atleast now i know more than i did yesterday.
Best wishes to you and all members. I hope that you have a pleasant day. Stay safe and healthy and make the most of life, my friends.