Why no shortcut icons in IE6 (SP2) favorites?

N

newsrider3

I used to have a lot of colorful unique shortcut icons with my favorites in
IE6 (XP Home SP2), but after a recent reinstallation of my op system they do
not appear. Almost everything now has the little default blue IE icon. That
makes a very bland-looking favorites list! Offhand the only link I see in my
favorites list with an icon is "Windows Marketplace", which was
automatically installed with the op system.

When I goto a website that has an associated icon, it should show in my IE
address windows, and also be included if I add it to my favorites list - but
it doesn't. Very few icons appear in the address window of IE, with only a
few exceptions such as the MSN butterfly. And the MSN butterfly doesn't
appear immediately, but may take awhile to show up.

What does it take to activate this feature in IE?
 
R

Ramesh [MVP]

Preserve the favicons using AM-Deadlink:
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/ie/favicon.htm

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User
http://windowsxp.mvps.org


I used to have a lot of colorful unique shortcut icons with my favorites in
IE6 (XP Home SP2), but after a recent reinstallation of my op system they do
not appear. Almost everything now has the little default blue IE icon. That
makes a very bland-looking favorites list! Offhand the only link I see in my
favorites list with an icon is "Windows Marketplace", which was
automatically installed with the op system.

When I goto a website that has an associated icon, it should show in my IE
address windows, and also be included if I add it to my favorites list - but
it doesn't. Very few icons appear in the address window of IE, with only a
few exceptions such as the MSN butterfly. And the MSN butterfly doesn't
appear immediately, but may take awhile to show up.

What does it take to activate this feature in IE?
 
N

newsrider3

Thanks. That one seems to work OK with my XP Home(SP2) using the IE method
for an Option setting (not theirs), otherwise their defaults of 2 checks
with 120 sec timeout each. At least it's running and finding a lot of icons.
Course it will take awhile with my 4,000+ favorites... :)

Tried putting my own icon in my website's root folder as favicon.htm and it
doesn't see it, so guess I'll have to try a different method there.

I still don't see any icons when I click the Favorites menu in IE, Add to
Favorites. It used to show an icon there too, but not any more. Wonder if
that's an intentional change in IE?
--
newsrider3



Preserve the favicons using AM-Deadlink:
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/ie/favicon.htm

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User
http://windowsxp.mvps.org


I used to have a lot of colorful unique shortcut icons with my favorites in
IE6 (XP Home SP2), but after a recent reinstallation of my op system they do
not appear. Almost everything now has the little default blue IE icon. That
makes a very bland-looking favorites list! Offhand the only link I see in my
favorites list with an icon is "Windows Marketplace", which was
automatically installed with the op system.

When I goto a website that has an associated icon, it should show in my IE
address windows, and also be included if I add it to my favorites list - but
it doesn't. Very few icons appear in the address window of IE, with only a
few exceptions such as the MSN butterfly. And the MSN butterfly doesn't
appear immediately, but may take awhile to show up.

What does it take to activate this feature in IE?
 
N

newsrider3

I did.
It's named "favicon.ico" and it's 16/16 pixels too!
Actually, it does show up in my favorites list, but only after the url has
been added to IE favorites. However...
--AM-Deadlink does not indicate that it found an icon when parsing my
website,
--it does not show in the IE address window when visiting the website, and
--it does not show in the "add to favorites" input box.
 
N

newsrider3

I tried putting

<LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON" href="http://path/favicon.ico">

between <HEAD> and <TITLE>, but it doesn't change anything. The icon only
appears in the IE address bar (and in the favorites list) if the website has
been added to IE favorites. Not otherwise. Just visiting a website doesn't
show their icon.

Why? Is that normal for the latest updated IE6(SP2) in XP Home, or is my IE
not working correctly? Is something blocking download of the icons, such as
the new security features in SP2?

I want to see the icons when I visit a website. That's important. How do I
get them back?
 
A

Alan Edwards

I can't speak for XP SP2 but it has been normal since IE5 recognized
favicons to only add the favicon if the website is added to the IE
favorites.
Read here:

How to Add a Shortcut Icon to a Web Page
http://msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/author/dhtml/howto/shortcuticon.asp

The relevant sentence:
"The only way a shortcut icon appears on a user's Favorites menu and
Address bar is if the user chooses to add your page as a favorite."

....Alan
 
N

newsrider3

OK, understood, thanks.
Well, it just doesn't seem reliable...
When I add a link to my IE favorites, the icon often doesn't appear. It may
appear later in erratic fashion. I can't predict when it will appear, nor
how long it will remain. For example after playing around for awhile, I can
get the icon from my website to appear in IE. Then it may disappear after
awhile. Even if I use AM-Deadlink to supposedly cache it more
permanently(?), it still disappears after awhile. AM-Deadlink is erratic in
that regard - sometimes it sees the favicon when it parses my website,
sometimes it doesn't. I've tried it with a couple of my different websites,
same thing. I can't find much reliable nor predictable about these favicons
in IE - disappointing. On the other hand, it looks like AM-Deadlink caches
some of the favicons in permanent fashion, so they remain after clearing
TIF, but not the icon from my website... :) I can't figure it out.
Frustrating.
 

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