Problem regarding the file type "shortcut"

[Omrikon]

I've looked around the forum, but it seems that there is nobody who has ever had this problem.

Although all the shortcut's themselves work fine, they all have the same exact icon. Normally, just changing the icon for each one would fix it, but the problem runs deeper than that. It appears that somehow, all the shortcuts have the file type "text document". After a while of comparing the file types present on both my laptop and my PC, I realized that there was a file type missing from my PC that appeared to be causing the problem. You see, when I went into Control Panel => Folder Options => File Types => New... => Advanced, and looked through all the associated file types, the file type "shortcut" was simply MISSING FROM MY PC ALTOGETHER.

Does anybody know of any way whatsoever which would change my shortcuts back to the file type "shortcut", so their icons can go back to the way they were?

All help is much appreciated.

[Staff]

Go back to the File Types tab in the Folder Options and look for a LNK extension. If it's not there, create a new association with LNK as the file extension and in the association box select Shortcut. If it is there then edit the association and select Shortcut. Hopefully, that should fix things for you.

[sasha]

[FONT=Fixedsys]DaBoss, it seems to me he was saying the associated type "Shortcut" was gone. The problem is dependent on the type of WINDOWS, but it also seems to me that the associated type list should be fixed by matching HCR\.lnk, HCR\lnkfile, but most importantly, its matching CLSID, given by "HCR\CLSID\" + the default of value of HCR\lnkfile\CLSID.
IMPORTANT: IF YOU DON'T DO ALL OF THIS SIMULTANEOUSLY, THE NEXT TIME YOU DO ANYTHING THAT UPDATES THE REGISTRY, THE CHANGES WILL BE REVERTED. That should work for WINDOWS XP.[/FONT]

[Staff]

That's quite possible as well. We'll see when Omrikon comes back and take it from there.

[Omrikon]

Well, I tried DaBoss's idea first, and the LNK file type was not present under the registered file types. Thus, I made the extension .lnk, and associated shortcuts with it. However, now the shortcuts don't open at all, and state

"Windows cannot open this file:
File: [something].lnk
To open this file, windows needs to know what program created it. Windows can go online to look it up automatically, or you can manually select from a list of programs on your computer"

Also, I am a bit new, so I have pretty much no clue as to what Sasha means in that post. How do I "match HCR\.lnk, HCR\lnkfile, or its CLSID and the default value of HCR\lnkfile\CLSID? I'm not really experienced with any of those aspects at all, so I'm going to need some help understanding how to match all that...

[Staff]

If the links worked OK before but had the wrong icon then go back and reverse what you did and you should then get back to that point at least. Or, hopefully you set a restore point before trying anything. If you did then just restore to that restore point to reverse the changes. (You should ALWAYS create a restore point before doing anything that changes the registry.)

I'll let sasha describe what he was posting about.

[Omrikon]

THANK YOU! The thing that was sent to me worked perfectly. Couldn't have done it without you two. Everything is finally back to normal...

[sasha]

[FONT=Fixedsys]You're quite welcome. You know, the funny thing is, I have a similar problem on my computer, and I cannot get the same to work. All other computers seem to work. Also, I figured asking here would be pointless.[/FONT]

[oren_k]

Sasha,

Reading through I think I have exactly the same problem you solved. Could you send me the files that solves this “Windows forgot the Folder/Shortcuts file type assignment”. I’m also using XP Home.

My Privet Email is oren.kalel@gmail.com

Thanks!

Oren