show desktop icon not working

I have desktop icon but it looks like a piece of paper with dog eared corner on top right hand side and it does not respond. I have worked trough malware to get it removed, chaslang suggested I come here for help.

this is all I have tried:

Go to Start/Run and type in "notepad" (without the quotes) then type in these lines:

[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

This does not work?

windows xp pro sp3
1gig ram
2meg

TIA for any help

 

Right click on START and select explore.
Navigate to c:\Documents and Settings\<your login name>\desktop

Do you see the shortcut there?

If not, do the same for c:\Documents and Settings\All Users\desktop and c:\Documents and Settings\Default Users\desktop.

 

don't have c:\Documents and Settings\Default Users\desktop I Thank you for your post ???????????? any other help would be great

 

plodr, I was able to delete icon with no trouble when I use the recreate formula I cannot get it to work I navigated to Documents and Settings\All Users\desktop- with no avail, the same blank icon comes up (empty) I do thank you for the help you are giving me and if you have any other suggestions I would love to hear about them. juntuo

 

OK.....how about the other directories?

 

If you single click on the ICON does it get selected? If you right click on it can you display its properties?

 

In my orininal post I explained what I was doing and microsoft is where I got the info to make it work again, but... it is not working!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/190355

I have followed directions icon comes up blank and empty???? juntuo

 

jconstan
no if I click on it nothing. right click nothing. everyother directory I have used workd fine.

 

jconstan

even though the directories are there the icon still comes up empty

 

You are trying to get a show desktop icon in the Quick Launch bar?

Try #61 on the right hand side http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm [save file to your computer and then double click it]

*kelly's korner is a trusted website

 

See if this works:

Open up any windows you want.

Hold down the windows key and press M. This should show the desktop. To reverse this, hold the windows key and shift, and then press M.

If this doesn't work, then I would suggest that the problem may run deeper than just this fault.

 

Change your desktop background and see if the icon remains.

 

jconstan

the icon stays on desktop when I change but still empty. Thanks for your help! I know I can use a keyboard short cut but the icon in the task bar works so much better for me, any other thoughts? juntuo

 

collinsl

Thank you for the keyboard shortcut any knowlege I can get I will take. thanks for the post. juntuo

 

sach2

thanks for that web site lots of cool things there, unfortunatly when I downloaded and ran program it put dead icon into task bar. Not sure what is going on? Thanks again for the cool site any other ideas pass them my way if you can. juntuo

 

If you are comfortable going into the registry check the association of .scf files:

Start>Run>type in regedit
Click the [+] sign next to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and scroll down to .scf, highlight it and in the right pane of the window see if its data is SHCmdFile
Close registry editor without making any changes.

 

sach2

I have no problem working in the registry. I have navigated to it to find...


(defalt) REG_SZ blank

so data is blank instead of SHCmdFile, any good way to fix this? thanks for spending the time. juntuo

 

I looked at mine and did two things.

Scrolling down to .scf I have a blank entry for value name and a value data of "SHCmdFile" You could double click where it says default which will open a window and type in SHCmdFile in the value data line. See if Show Desktop works. [I don't believe a reboot is necessary]

I also searched (Edit>Find menu) for SHCmdFile and made sure there was entry for that as well. If adding the data value to .scf doesn't work maybe you could search for SHCmdFile and export that key to your documents folder and compare to the attached file to see if there are any differences.

I exported both keys from my XP Pro SP3 and attached them to this post. I believe you could merge them to any XP version without any conflicts. [I added a .txt ending for attachment purposes--so they will open with notepad rather than try to merge by default]

 

sach2

THAT DID IT! note: icon is still piece of paper with dog eared corner, but I have the functioning icon. Thanks for spending the time to help me out! juntuo

 

Good!

Did you only have to add the value data to .scf or did you have to create/edit the SHCmdFile key as well?

It looks like the icon for my Show Desktop is explorer.exe,3 I don't know if trying this will make any difference on your system.

Good Luck!

 

sach2

all i had to do was overwrite blank with SHCmdFile and it became active again and when I did reboot icon came back! thanks for the time and errort! juntuo

 

Thanks for posting back. I was thinking rebooting might fix the icon.