I'm Stumped: How to Rename Shortcuts

[fornax]

I was working on one of my laptops a few days ago (it has Win XP Pro) and suddenly noticed that all shortcuts (desktop, Quick Launch, Start Menu) have the .lnk extension appended to them. Here is the strange thing: if I rename the shortcut (say, from EAC.lnk to EAC), Windows claims it is of type "File" and no longer considers it a shortcut!

What happened? And how can rename shortcuts so that they don't show .lnk extension and still be shortcuts?

All my other computers where I have Windows XP behave normally, i.e. a shortcut could be called BLABLA (not BLABLA.lnk) and Windows still knows that this is a shortcut.

I know that by default Windows suppresses the .lnk extension. Did I turn that off by accident and do I go back?

 

[Zugzwang152]

open a windows explorer window, go to Tools -> Folder Options -> View. Check box that says "Hide extensions for known file types". Apply. Done.

 

[fornax]

I'd like to have the extensions visible. They're set not to be hidden on all my other WinXP machines but nevertheless the .lnk extension is not visible on those.

 

[thegorx]

the answer has to be in the registry there is no mystery there
restore a back up or check out how your extensions look in the registry

 

[Sunner]

Doesn't TweakUI have an option to change that? Or am I just not remembering it right?

 

[Tarrant64]

I believe TweakUI does have that option.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: Tarrant64
I believe TweakUI does have that option.

Absolutely correct - Tweak-UI does have that option - so do some other utilities. You can also opt not to have the silly shortcut arrows on the desktop icons.

 

[thegorx]

frankly, I think it's the use of utilities that are causing such things
if a person has a clear understanding of where these settings are there would be no need for these utilities.

which often cause more harm than good

but if you're looking for a fix, just restore a registry back up

don't tell be you don't have a your registry backed up.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: thegorx
frankly, I think it's the use of utilities that are causing such things

Bingo. Also why I hate any post that starts with 'after following Black Viper's advice....'

Bill

 

[fornax]

Yeah, I think I'm going to do a restore, but I'm still curious. I found another interesting thing: only the shortcuts of user-installed programs have the .lnk extension. The shortcuts of the Windows programs (like Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> ....) do not have the extension, they can be renamed and Windows still knows that these are shortcuts. Howvere if I rename the shortcut of a user-installed program, Windows forgets that this is a shortcut.