Cannot open shortcut

[djr33]

A simpler solution to all of this might just be making new shortcuts. If you can make a new shortcut on the desktop and it works, then you might able to avoid "fixing" it by just making new shortcuts to everything you need.
Whether you can or can't make new shortcuts will also help the process of figuring out what is wrong.

Of course what Blizzard says above is the correct way to actually fix what went wrong, but it might take a lot of time to figure it out, and if you can avoid that by just making new shortcuts, it might be easier for you.

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Note: the process of making new shortcuts involves finding the original, somewhere on your harddrive (C:/ probably), then looking through /program files/ and other places where applications are stored. Find the "program.exe" (where 'program' is whatever software you want) and then create a shortcut to it. Be careful not to move/delete anything while looking around inside the system folders, but just looking won't hurt, nor will creating shortcuts.
You can create a shortcut by right clicking and making a shortcut (it will appear in that folder-- drag it to the desktop) or right click "send to" and choose "desktop as shortcut".
The easier way would be to copy and paste (on the icon right click, copy; on the desktop right click, paste) from the start menu if you still have all the shortcuts you need there.
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Also, if you have not already done so, be sure that these programs still exist. The shortcut will not work if it has nothing to point to, such as if the program was deleted. That might be the case (if something went terribly wrong in the update), so you could have to restore to an older setup or perhaps reformat the computer. If you can open the programs (like word and firefox) other ways, then this is not the problem.
(But, in theory, the update could have MOVED the files to that the shortcuts can't find them. That would be unusual, but, again-- in theory-- possible.)


One possibility for why they don't work is that you might not have the same permissions as before the update if something got changed or your user profile was updated (such as whether you are/were "admin" and other issues like that).


If for some reason none of the ideas above or the ideas from Blizzard can help, you could of course just try to reinstall all the software and that should restore the shortcuts on the desktop (unless the update corrupted some major system files, etc., which is very unlikely).

[BLiZZaRD]

Everything Daniel says is correct. However, if the problem isn't because of the updates then you probably should know. Could be a little virus, could be a rouge registry problem... I know that for me, I would want to know why the problem exists and try to get rid of that problem.

Which is what I am trying to do for Amyy. If I am alone in that way of thinking, I understand (won't be the first time ) and I will just hush.

[amyy]

Greatly appreciate Blizzard and dir3 for both your detailed and thorough response to my queries.

I have followed all the steps provided...
checking the control panel,
rebooting the PC in safe mode,
reinstall the programs (Firefox etc) that come with a shortcut
I could create shortcut and access newly created shortcuts

While the PC is in safe mode, I still could not access the "shortcut to Word Documents" files that I created earlier. As these doc files contain updates that are not available in the original files, I need to find ways to retrieve them.

I reboot the PC to the normal mode.
When my cursor moves to one of the "shortcut to Word Document", I notice that the location of the file is "G:desktop" and not "C:desktop" , G being my external harddrive.
Likewise for all the other "shortcut to Word Documents" (all the location happened to be "G:desktop" )which are inaccessible.

It is at this point in time that I go to "My Computer" and found that the G drive icon is missing!!!!
I unplug and replug the external harddrive and the problem is now resolved.

Thank you so much to both Blizzard and dir3, especially Blizzard, for the time and effort both of you spent in helping me to resolve the problem.
I greatly appreciate it.

[BLiZZaRD]

Yay!

So it was a missing directory.. just not the "Desktop".

Glad it is resolved!