How do you remove broken shortcuts?

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Biggles604

Weaksauce
Joined
Nov 23, 2004
Messages
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I have 2 broken shortcuts in the start menu quicklaunch (Not the task bar quick launch, the one in the start menu, on the left). The shortcuts have kept their original names, but are not valid, and cannot be removed from the list, nor can they be renamed, edited or changed in any other way.
Does anyone know how to repair/remove these two links. One is for Avant Browser, the other for Windows Media Player. I tried uninstalling and reinstalling the programs, but they are detached from the installation, so it did nothing.
I have thought about running the recovery console, but I don't know where the list is stored on the drive, so I can't manually edit it, any ideas?

Thanks
 
can you post a pic? I assume this is the XP start menu, but all my shortcuts have "Remove from this list" in their context menus.
 
I'm at work so no pic for a while.
The broken shortcuts have their original name, but the icon is that of an unknown windows file type. The 'Remove Shortcut From This List' is available, but does nothing. Also the properties option brings up a completely empty shortcut, and nothing can be changed.
 
Open My Computer.
Go to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu
And any other users listed there (ex.)
C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Start Menu
Delete entries
You may have to go one more directory deeper.
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs
 
Mister Natural said:
Go to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu
Click to expand...
That doesn't contain shortcuts on the start menu itself, only those within "All Programs"

You might try RClicking the taskbar -> Properties -> Start Menu -> Customize. That might help you fix the Avant Browser one, at least. Not sure how WMP links in, so I don't know on that one.
 
Even if I clear the list through the start menu options, the two broken links remain, and I can't find where they reside. I am thinking it may be a registry entry, not a shortcut file directory.
 
are you talking about the programs on the left hand side of the start menu?

These are the most common program's you've recently viewed. To remove just one, you'd right click on it and select "Remove from this list" but I guess that doesn't work for you as described above.

Try this. Right-click on your start menu, select "Properties" . Under Start Menu, select "Customize". On the "General" tab in the middle, click on "Clear List" - This should remove ALL of the shorcuts on the menu. If you're worried about something going missing, just open up the program manually again.

If this doesn't work you can either open up more programs to push these down the list (It's a most commonly used program list) or try a registry cleaner (I use regcleaner). That should find broken links and remove them too.

Hope one of these helps..
 
Or how about right clicking on the shortcut in question and selecting delete?
Another stab in the dark since I'm not clear on the situation either.
 
As I already mentioned, I cannot remove them from the list in the normal manner, I cannot push them up, the list will just be x+2 long rather than x, and I can't clear the list from the properties menu -> Clear all programs from list. They're stuck
I ran the reg cleaner from Treak Utilities 2004 and that did nothing (even though they should have registered as orphaned files.
 
What kind of error are you getting if you try to remove them manually by right clicking? is there an error you get when you try to remove them through the customization menu?

There might be a conflict somewhere. Try booting up in Safe-Mode and see if that helps with removing those files.
 
I did find out something else. The most commonly used shortcuts list is being cleared as it should be. These broken links are appearing above them with a seperator, in a seperate list of quicklaunch programs (not the same quicklaunch from the task bar). I'm not sure if this is a standard feature of windows or if it's a tweak that I had implemented.
Does that help anyone?
 
Yes, that makes a big difference.

Right-click on your start menu and select "Preferences". On the Start Menu tab, click on "Customize". There's a section called "Show on Start Menu". Either uncheck the two boxes below, or select new programs that work (so you won't have broken shortcuts).

That should remove/change the shortcuts that are at the top of the start menu.

~Mike
 
These weren't links that were added in that manner. They were dragged and dropped as shortcuts. adding more shortcuts doesn't push them off the list or replace them.
 
Here is the images you've been waiting for.
The start menu:
start.jpg


And the broken shortcut properties:
properties.jpg
 
are the target windows editable? you could enter a text doc or some file to make it a valid shortcut and then see if it will delete
 
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