Managing your lab with Windows XP

Shortcuts and Icons

• Introduction
  
• Create an icon on the desktop
  
• Creating icons that show up for ALL users
  
• Create an icon on the Start Menu
  

This document explains shortcut/icon management.

Shortcuts are links to actual files, these files can be executable (programs) or links to documents etc. In the old days on DOS to run a program one either used a menu program which had text shortcuts to run the programs, or they changed to the working directory of the program and ran the executable. The path to the desired file must be known to create a shortcut. This is where the search function comes in handy.

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To create an icon on your desktop:

First you need to know the path, for Word the shortcut needs to point to winword.exe
Click Start
Click Search
Select "All files and folders" (third choice down from the top).
Type winword.exe in the "all or part of the filename" box.
Look for the winword.exe that exists in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office*, the "*" can represent a number.
You can double click the filename and Word should launch, this is a good test to insure your shortcut points to the correct file. Click here for view
Click the "-" sign at the top right to minimize the Search window
Right click (that is the right mouse button!) on your desktop, select new/shortcut
Click the browse button, using the path shown in the Search Window navigate to the winword.exe file Click here for view
Click next
Here you can name the new icon
Click finish

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Create an Icon for use with ALL users

One can take any icon and copy it to a special location where EVERYONE will now have it in either their start menu or desktop. One must have administrative access on the machine to make this all work.

Log into the unit with an account that has admin rights
Create or find the icon you need
Copy the icon
Open Windows Explorer
Drill down to this path C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Desktop or C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu
Paste your icon to this folder

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Build the icon in your start menu:

Use the Search directions above to find the path (location) of the winword.exe
Right click on the Start button (lower left of screen)
Select Open Click here for view
Double click on "programs", it is a folder.
In a lower white spot:

Right click (that is the right mouse button!), select new/shortcut
Click the browse button, using the path shown in the Search Window navigate to the winword.exe file Click here for view
Click next
Here you can name the new icon
Click finish

If you are trying to create an icon and do not know the name of the launch file:

Get in front of another computer that DOES have the icon and right click on it, select properties
Click the shortcut tab at the top
Look at the target path
This works in most instances.

Why are the icons disappearing?

Each user has their own "user space" when using Windows XP, each user requires a unique account. In a large environment such as ours we use central authentication so the accounts only have to be created once on the server versus once on every machine. The user's settings are saved (hopefully) to the server upon log-out. Currently we have 3 versions of Microsoft Office in use. The versions are Office 2000, Office XP, and Office 2003. Since going to Office 2003 we have been experiencing the disappearing icon syndrome. It seems Microsoft decided to change the install path (location) of the Office files. When the older (Office) icons exist on a desktop that gets accessed in the labs with Office 2003 they disappear. This because the path (location) is now invalid due to the different installation locations. Also when one attempts to place the icon back on the desktop FROM the start menu they may have inadvertently moved it versus copying it. It is now gone for everyone (possibly).