If your original W7 Start Menu had two versions of a program
*anywhere* in it - as does mine, twice over, because besides the
current version of Firefox I have an older version with a different
profile for debugging my website, and I have two Thunderbird profiles,
one for mail, and the other for news - then Windows, even Windows 7,
is incapable of distinguishing between the two.
Rant: This is the sort of exasperating, maddening time-wasting shit
that happens every time I try and domesticate Windows 10 or 11, and
usually I just give up and revert to 7, which, though it took a long
time a while back, I was able in the end to house-train sufficiently to
make it ergonomically efficient and thus very usable. I've never been
able to achieve this in Windows 10 or 11.
Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote:
[About trying to customize the Windows 10 Start menu:]
I can't really give any suggestions on this as I never tried to
customize the Windows 10 (or 8.1 or 11) Start menu. But given that you
like the Windows 7 Start menu, why don't you just install Open-Shell
Menu [1] and get what's essentially a Windows 7 like Start menu? (One of
the 'Start Menu Style's is 'Windows 7 style'. I use 'Classic with two columns', because it's more like Vista (I never had 7).)
I've used (Classic Start Menu and) Open-Shell Menu on Windows 8.1, 10
and 11, because none of them had/have a 'real' Windows Start Menu.
You can have *both* the native Start menu *and* Open-Shell Menu. You
can invoke the native Start menu from the Open-Shell Menu. And you can
hide Open-Shell Menu.
"Open-Shell Menu, don't leave home without it!"
[1] <https://open-shell.github.io/Open-Shell-Menu/>
N.B. The GitHub page does not have any screenshots, but on the old
Classic Shell page you can get some idea of what it looks like (<http://www.classicshell.net/>).
Frank Slootweg wrote:
Java Jive <java> wrote:
[About trying to customize the Windows 10 Start menu:]
I can't really give any suggestions on this as I never tried to
customize the Windows 10 (or 8.1 or 11) Start menu. But given that you
like the Windows 7 Start menu, why don't you just install Open-Shell
Menu [1] and get what's essentially a Windows 7 like Start menu? (One of
the 'Start Menu Style's is 'Windows 7 style'. I use 'Classic with two columns', because it's more like Vista (I never had 7).)
I've used (Classic Start Menu and) Open-Shell Menu on Windows 8.1, 10
and 11, because none of them had/have a 'real' Windows Start Menu.
You can have *both* the native Start menu *and* Open-Shell Menu. You
can invoke the native Start menu from the Open-Shell Menu. And you can
hide Open-Shell Menu.
"Open-Shell Menu, don't leave home without it!"
[1] https://open-shell.github.io/Open-Shell-Menu/
N.B. The GitHub page does not have any screenshots, but on the old
Classic Shell page you can get some idea of what it looks like
( http://www.classicshell.net/ ).
On Mon, 10 Feb 2025 14:31:38 +0000, Java Jive wrote:
If your original W7 Start Menu had two versions of a program
*anywhere* in it - as does mine, twice over, because besides the
current version of Firefox I have an older version with a different
profile for debugging my website, and I have two Thunderbird profiles,
one for mail, and the other for news - then Windows, even Windows 7,
is incapable of distinguishing between the two.
I haven't tried this, but the start menu shortcuts are
in
"%programdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs"
Can you give different names to the shortcuts to the
running with the two profiles?
On 2/10/2025 9:31 AM, Java Jive wrote:
Rant:Â This is the sort of exasperating, maddening time-wasting shit
that happens every time I try and domesticate Windows 10 or 11, and
usually I just give up and revert to 7, which, though it took a long
time a while back, I was able in the end to house-train sufficiently
to make it ergonomically efficient and thus very usable. I've never
been able to achieve this in Windows 10 or 11.
 As Stan indicated, the solution is to clean up the Start
Menu folders. (There's yours and all users. I just put
everything into all users for convenience.) I create
folders, like Office, Utilities, etc. Then I delete all but
actual program shortcuts, name them as desired, and
put them in the approriate folder.
On 2025-02-10 16:45, Newyana2 wrote:
On 2/10/2025 9:31 AM, Java Jive wrote:
Rant: This is the sort of exasperating, maddening time-wasting shit
that happens every time I try and domesticate Windows 10 or 11, and
usually I just give up and revert to 7, which, though it took a long
time a while back, I was able in the end to house-train sufficiently
to make it ergonomically efficient and thus very usable. I've never
been able to achieve this in Windows 10 or 11.
As Stan indicated, the solution is to clean up the Start
Menu folders. (There's yours and all users. I just put
everything into all users for convenience.) I create
folders, like Office, Utilities, etc. Then I delete all but
actual program shortcuts, name them as desired, and
put them in the approriate folder.
I did all that for the original W7 Start Menu that works, but neither of
you seem to have noticed that the Start Menu folders, system or user,
are largely ignored in Windows 10
determines what 'tiles' appear on the RHS of a given user's Start Menu
in Windows 10? I, a Windows user since 3.1 of some 40 years standing,
who has created all the Windows builds used in a major UK financial
business, have no fucking idea.
*Logically* and *rationally* (terms that Microsoft programmers don't
seem to understand) you'd expect there to be a sub-folder of the user's profile containing the icons that the user has pinned to Start. Based
on Windows 7, I'd expect it to be ...
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick
Launch\User Pinned\StartMenu
One of the first things I do in Windows 10 is remove all the Microshit
bloat tiles from the Start 'Menu', and drag its right-hand border
inwards to leave just the program list. However, today I thought that I might try to use the Start 'Menu' as originally intended, and put my own stuff there, because using the program list supplied by Windows 10 is
just a PITA, a significant problem being:
:-(Â If your original W7 Start Menu had two versions of a program
*anywhere* in it - as does mine, twice over, because besides the
current version of Firefox I have an older version with a different
profile for debugging my website, and I have two Thunderbird profiles,
one for mail, and the other for news - then Windows, even Windows 7,
is incapable of distinguishing between the two.
The two Firefox versions weren't much of a problem in Windows 7, because
they are in Start Menu links, and, because the command lines in the
links are different because the profile parameter is different, they
appear correctly as two different items in the one submenu where they
appear together, and I can pin the current version to the Start Menu to
have it available at the top level there without W7 getting confused
between the two. Not so in Windows 10+, which insists on offering
*only* the legacy debugging version when I start to type F-i-r-e-f-o-x,
which frankly seems utterly perverse. However I could just uninstall
the legacy version, so, although immensely irritating because it's just another example of Microshit bug-gery causing unnecessary problems
through lack of thought and proper testing, I can probably get around it.
The two Thunderbird links were more of a problem even in Windows 7,
because I wanted them both pinned to the top-level of the Start Menu,
and, because they linked to the same program, I could only have one or
the other, not both. I got over this by creating two links to thunderbird.exe called thunderbird_mail.exe and thunderbird_news.exe and putting those in the command line of the Start Menu links, and then
pinning both to the Start Menu successfully. But this ruse no longer
works in Windows 10, so when I pin the first, I only get an option to
unpin the second, even though it's not pinned.
I've spent over an hour this morning on my third ranked PC trying to get around this problem before backing up W10 and upgrading it to Windows
11. Can anyone suggest how I can get the two links onto the Start Menu?
 For reference, the two command-lines are ...
   Target:   <link path>\thunderbird_mail.exe -no-remote -P Mail
   Start in: <profile path>\Mail
... and ...
   Target:   <link path>\thunderbird_news.exe -no-remote -P News
   Start in: <profile path>\News
Another problem:Â One might have thought I could just select all the
links in the top level of my W7 Start Menu, still there in W10 but
ignored by it, <rt-click> the selection, and choose 'Pin to Start'? Not
so fast and convenient, it only pins the first in the selection, so
really that's yet another bug.
Another problem:Â Digiguide, admittedly quite an old version, but it
works in Windows 7, is prevented from running in Windows 10, without any explanation as to why.
Rant:Â This is the sort of exasperating, maddening time-wasting shit
that happens every time I try and domesticate Windows 10 or 11, and
usually I just give up and revert to 7, which, though it took a long
time a while back, I was able in the end to house-train sufficiently to
make it ergonomically efficient and thus very usable. I've never been
able to achieve this in Windows 10 or 11.
On 2/10/2025 12:50 PM, Java Jive wrote:
On 2025-02-10 16:45, Newyana2 wrote:
On 2/10/2025 9:31 AM, Java Jive wrote:
Rant:Â This is the sort of exasperating, maddening time-wasting shit
that happens every time I try and domesticate Windows 10 or 11, and
usually I just give up and revert to 7, which, though it took a long
time a while back, I was able in the end to house-train sufficiently
to make it ergonomically efficient and thus very usable. I've never
been able to achieve this in Windows 10 or 11.
  As Stan indicated, the solution is to clean up the Start
Menu folders. (There's yours and all users. I just put
everything into all users for convenience.) I create
folders, like Office, Utilities, etc. Then I delete all but
actual program shortcuts, name them as desired, and
put them in the approriate folder.
I did all that for the original W7 Start Menu that works, but neither
of you seem to have noticed that the Start Menu folders, system or
user, are largely ignored in Windows 10
 Ah. Sorry, I didn't know that. To my mind the Win10/11 Start
 Menus are so bad that I've never really used them. I just install Classic/Open Shell and it works as expected.
 (actually IMS it's Windows 8+). What
determines what 'tiles' appear on the RHS of a given user's Start Menu
in Windows 10? I, a Windows user since 3.1 of some 40 years standing,
who has created all the Windows builds used in a major UK financial
business, have no fucking idea.
*Logically* and *rationally* (terms that Microsoft programmers don't
seem to understand) you'd expect there to be a sub-folder of the
user's profile containing the icons that the user has pinned to
Start. Based on Windows 7, I'd expect it to be ...
  %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick
Launch\User Pinned\StartMenu
 You lost me there. I use Quick Launch on the taskbar. (Which must be
set up in Windows 10.) I don't know
from Start Menu pinning. The solution I offered was only for once you actually open the Programs menu on the Start Menu. The folders and
shortcuts in the Start Menu folders are felected there as menus and
submenus.
My Start Menu folders are as follows:
C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu
As noted, I combine the two in all users, leaving nothing in my
personal folder. https://i.postimg.cc/JnznQkWk/startmenu.jpg
.. simply right click each profile shortcut and select the pin option.
On 10/02/2025 19:00, MikeS wrote:
Meant to write
.. simply right click each profile shortcut and select the pin option.
I did all that for the original W7 Start Menu that works, but neither of
you seem to have noticed that the Start Menu folders, system or user,
are largely ignored in Windows 10 (actually IMS it's Windows 8+). What determines what 'tiles' appear on the RHS of a given user's Start Menu
in Windows 10? I, a Windows user since 3.1 of some 40 years standing,
who has created all the Windows builds used in a major UK financial
business, have no fucking idea.
*Logically* and *rationally* (terms that Microsoft programmers don't
seem to understand) you'd expect there to be a sub-folder of the user's profile containing the icons that the user has pinned to Start. Based
on Windows 7, I'd expect it to be ...
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick
Launch\User Pinned\StartMenu
... but, if that was really the case, everything in that folder at the
time of upgrading to W10 should automatically appear on a user's Start
Menu, but it doesn't; moreover, there doesn't seem to be a folder that contains the bloat crap that does appear on a user's Start Menu, so I
think it must now be held in the registry somewhere.
On 2025-02-10 19:03, MikeS wrote:
On 10/02/2025 19:00, MikeS wrote:
Meant to write
.. simply right click each profile shortcut and select the pin option.
Exactly what I was trying to do, but it behaves as described in my OP.
The only thing that's different from what you describe is that, to get
it to work in W7, I had to create the two file links (note, file links
using mklink, not shortcut links) to thunderbird.exe. Perhaps if in W10
I replace the file links in the command lines of the two shortcuts with thunderbird directly it might work? Given what happened in Windows 7 it would be completely illogical, so maybe that's a sign that it will work!
 I will try it later and report back.
On 2025-02-10 19:24, Java Jive wrote:
On 2025-02-10 19:03, MikeS wrote:
On 10/02/2025 19:00, MikeS wrote:
Meant to write
.. simply right click each profile shortcut and select the pin option.
Exactly what I was trying to do, but it behaves as described in my OP.
The only thing that's different from what you describe is that, to get
it to work in W7, I had to create the two file links (note, file links
using mklink, not shortcut links) to thunderbird.exe. Perhaps if in
W10 I replace the file links in the command lines of the two shortcuts
with thunderbird directly it might work? Given what happened in
Windows 7 it would be completely illogical, so maybe that's a sign
that it will work! Â Â I will try it later and report back.
Yup! As illogical as predicted, that worked! So, to clarify ...
W7:Â Use mklink to create file links to thunderbird.exe with different names, in my case ...
   thunderbird_mail.exe
   thunderbird_news.exe
... and then in the shortcut 'Target' field replace the part of the commandline that is ...
   <path>\thunderbird.exe
... with, using the mail version as an example for both, ...
   <possibly different path>\thunderbird_mail.exe
W10:Â Leave alone, or undo the above, as appropriate.
The kindest interpretation is that M$ realised that the W7 situation is
a bug, and fixed it by the time of W10, but even so, their new method of creating these things is a pig's dinner compared with the old:
   - If you use different icons to distinguish between the two in W7, the choices of icon are not respected in W10, so, if in W10 you use
small icons that don't display the text name, you can't tell which is
which.
On 11/02/2025 13:25, Java Jive wrote:
On 2025-02-10 19:24, Java Jive wrote:
On 2025-02-10 19:03, MikeS wrote:Yup! As illogical as predicted, that worked! So, to clarify ...
Exactly what I was trying to do, but it behaves as described in my
On 10/02/2025 19:00, MikeS wrote:
Meant to write
.. simply right click each profile shortcut and select the pin option. >>>
OP. The only thing that's different from what you describe is that,
to get it to work in W7, I had to create the two file links (note,
file links using mklink, not shortcut links) to thunderbird.exe.
Perhaps if in W10 I replace the file links in the command lines of
the two shortcuts with thunderbird directly it might work? Given
what happened in Windows 7 it would be completely illogical, so maybe
that's a sign that it will work! Â Â I will try it later and report back. >>
W7:Â Use mklink to create file links to thunderbird.exe with different
names, in my case ...
    thunderbird_mail.exe
    thunderbird_news.exe
... and then in the shortcut 'Target' field replace the part of the
commandline that is ...
    <path>\thunderbird.exe
... with, using the mail version as an example for both, ...
    <possibly different path>\thunderbird_mail.exe
W10:Â Leave alone, or undo the above, as appropriate.
The kindest interpretation is that M$ realised that the W7 situation
is a bug, and fixed it by the time of W10, but even so, their new
method of creating these things is a pig's dinner compared with the old:
    - If you use different icons to distinguish between the two in
W7, the choices of icon are not respected in W10, so, if in W10 you
use small icons that don't display the text name, you can't tell which
is which.
Different icons are no problem in my 10 or 11.
Just pick one of the shortcuts, right click, select Properties, click
Change icon. You can choose from another icon in the .exe or browse to
an icon of your choice.
| Sysop: | Keyop |
|---|---|
| Location: | Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK |
| Users: | 508 |
| Nodes: | 16 (3 / 13) |
| Uptime: | 219:39:24 |
| Calls: | 9,974 |
| Calls today: | 5 |
| Files: | 13,833 |
| Messages: | 6,358,759 |
