"Restarting" the Desktop?

[dbminter]

You know... I never thought of it before, until I finally needed it. But, how do you "restart" the "Desktop?" You know what I mean, when EXPLORER crashes and the Desktop disappears, along with the Start menu, the Notification Area, and the System Tray. How can all this crap be brought back? I've just used CTRL+ALT+DEL to start a new EXPLORER which lets me access where I keep a shortcut to my Desktop, but, that only displays the folder in a tree view, and the Trays are still gone.

 

 

I realize I may need a batch series of commands to get all the appropriate stuff restarted, with the right switches, etc. but, I'm up to the task. I just realized, though, I don't know what the damn stuff Microsoft fucked together to get all this shit up when Windows starts.

 

 

Thanks!

[Shamus_McFartfinger]

I find it's less painful to swear at it and then reboot instead of trying to figure out how to restart it from what remains of the desktop. Seeing as though damned near everything revolves around explorer.exe, and if Explorer crashes, I wouldn't hold out much hope for recovery. That's what the big button is for.

[dbminter]

Yes, that's what I've done. CTRL+ALT+DEL and use the shutdown there. However, sometimes, you have something running you need to complete, so, might as well try to get some work done in the meantime.

[Shamus_McFartfinger]

Agreed. It's one of the reasons I like linux. If an application craps itself the rest of the OS continues regardless. No Blues Screens Of Death etc. Having said that, I find my linux box unusable today after an upgrade last night which seems to have killed it. I wish I knew more about how it works.

[LIGHTNING UK!]

ctrl+alt+del, task manager -> File -> New Task (run) -> 'explorer.exe' -> ok.

 

If tray icons don't come back, go moan to the people that make those apps and have them listen to the right messages to capture the fact that explorer has just started and the system tray has just been created.

 

i.e.

 

WM_TASKBARCREATED = RegisterWindowMessage("TaskbarCreated");

 

Then listen for WM_TASKBARCREATED being passed to the application. When it is, recreate the systemtray icon.

[zacoz]

It's a sad fact that most apps I use don't reappear in the system tray if explorer crashes, although explorer generally always automatically restarts itself ok.

[LIGHTNING UK!]

Seriously, get onto them and tell them that then!

 

They can't be huge apps or the companies would have already taken care of this issue. And being small, the developers are more likely to listen to the end user.

 

I've made 2 companies aware of this problem in their apps and they've since fixed it. But I guess we're not using the same programs

[dbminter]

I've never had the System Tray or the Notification Area return at ALL! i.e. I can restart apps, but, they don't show up in Trays because there was no tray. Even when I start EXPLORER, all it does is open a tree base view. It does let me get to my folder with my Desktop, which is SOMETHING, but, the tray areas themselves always need to be restarted. They just ain't there, hoss.