WHY ALL THE SHORTCUTS IN WIN EXPLORER?

[Guest]

One of the most useful tool I use is Windows Explorer.... and I have to say
there are some decent features in the new Vista version and some features I
loathe. For instance the removal of the Move To, Copy To, and Delete icons.
(if anyone knows how to restore them please please please tell me. I really
hate the new file management system.)

What is driving me nuts are all those seemingly useless shortcuts in the
directory tree. They are non-functional... all I get is denied access or
location unavailable. So why did MS bother to clog up the directory tree with
these things? Are they safe to delete?

Thanks!

 

[Jimmy Brush]

Hello,

You should not delete these. They are not shortcuts. They are there to
provide backwards compatability for applications under certain scenarios.
The only reason you see them is because you have enabled the viewing of
protected operating system files.

 

[Guest]

You should not delete these. They are not shortcuts. They are there to
provide backwards compatability for applications under certain scenarios.
The only reason you see them is because you have enabled the viewing of
protected operating system files.

Yes I recognize some of the folder shortcuts are from the XP file
structure... so I can see why they may be useful should I have reinstalled
Vista over XP.

But since I bought a new PC.... with Vista preinstalled.... do I really need
any of these shortcuts that Vista in its infinite wisdom has already decided
not to use?

Put another way... I just don't see the point of not clearing away what
appears to be junk. What am I missing?

 

[Jimmy Brush]

These are not shortcuts, they are part of the application compatability
layer of Windows Vista. Since they are part of the operating system, I do
not recommend that you delete them, as other parts of the OS may assume they
are there, and deleting them could have unforseen consequences.

- JB

 

[Guest]

Thanks Shawn... it can only be an improvement over the idiotic file
management system in Vista. What were they thinking? The old file management
system from 98/ME/XP worked just fine. What really fries me is that MS went
out of its way to NOT have those easy up/move/copy/delete icons. About 2/3 of
the time I try to manage files something goes wrong. I can't grab more than
one because some file type icon appear and gets dragged around... or I try to
copy but there's only a move option... or just as I'm ready to move a file...
the directory expands and the file lands up in the wrong place.

Will this work for Vista 32?

 

[Guest]

You should not delete these. They are not shortcuts. They are there to
provide backwards compatability for applications under certain scenarios.
The only reason you see them is because you have enabled the viewing of
protected operating system files.

OK... for instance let's take the most basic scenario... there's one of
these "shortcuts" for "My Documents". But there already is a DOCUMENTS folder
containing my files. How can this "shortcut" be of ANY use? Yes I can see if
I installed Vista on an XP machine it might want to reserve some spot on the
C drive directory tree...

Yes I have the option on to view all files. If I didn't I'd never be able to
experiment on how to reintegrate some of my old files such as mail, into the
new programs. But aside from that I don't like having hidden files out of
principle. Maybe if I had kids around that'd be different.

 

[Jimmy Brush]

OK... for instance let's take the most basic scenario... there's one of
these "shortcuts" for "My Documents". But there already is a DOCUMENTS
folder
containing my files. How can this "shortcut" be of ANY use? Yes I can see
if
I installed Vista on an XP machine it might want to reserve some spot on
the
C drive directory tree...

Yes I have the option on to view all files. If I didn't I'd never be able
to
experiment on how to reintegrate some of my old files such as mail, into
the
new programs. But aside from that I don't like having hidden files out of
principle. Maybe if I had kids around that'd be different.

These are there for backwards compatability with non-compliant applications.
Specifically, applications that reference files inside hard-coded paths for
whatever reason, instead of querying the OS for the correct folder
locations.

While the most obvious use of these is for windows xp upgraded to windows
vista scenarios (think most recently used file lists in a variety of
applications), there are still many instances where an app can be installed
on a fresh copy of vista, be non-compliant, and still need to make use of
these junctions.

For example, a program may be installed that puts an ini file into the all
users application data folder whedurring installation. The installer
probably will put it in the correct folder without using the junctions.
However, the application may have hard-coded the path to the Windows XP
location, say, c:\documents and settings\all users\application data\super
duper app\myini.ini. The junctions would insure that this app would work in
Vista, even though that location no longer exists.

Same thing goes for "My Documents" - a program may have hard-coded a path
into here for some reason or another.

An application can also get it "half right". For instance, it may query the
OS for the user profile folder, and then tack on "My Documents\My
Videos\file_attempting_to_access" to the path. Or, it may query the user's
my documents folder, and then tack on "\my music\file_attempting_to_access"
to the end. The junctions make these works in Vista, when otherwise they
would fail.

Plus, as a general rule, if the OS expects these to be here, only bad things
can happen if you remove them, even if you don't have any applications that
are using them. Windows is a complex beast, and the interdependencies it has
can cause weird, seemingly unrelated problems when you go messing about with
things that it expects to be there.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the extended explanation Jimmy. So the bottom line is if one is
careful some of these paths can be safely deleted. So my new question is how
can they be recreated if necessary? Thanks!

 

[Jimmy Brush]

Thanks for the extended explanation Jimmy. So the bottom line is if one is

careful some of these paths can be safely deleted. So my new question is
how
can they be recreated if necessary? Thanks!

No, the bottom line is that you should not mess with these, because even if
you are careful you can't know what effect it will have.

Also, system utilities may have a hard time deleting the junctions (they may
delete the target folder instead!)

For the sake of completeness, however, I will provide guidance for
recreating the most common junctions:

- Open an elevated command prompt (right-click command prompt, click run as
administrator)
- Type the following commands:

mklink /j "path_to_junction" "path_to_target"
icacls "path_to_junction" /deny everyones,rd) /L

Example:

mklink /j "c:\users\default user" "c:\users\default"
icacls "c:\users\default user" /deny everyones,rd) /L

NOTE: Each junction has its own unique security settings. These commands do
not restore the junction security settings back to their exact defaults.
This could have consequences.