Windows 10: Pinned taskbar fails

[thedave]

TCC 18.00.29 x64 Windows 10 [Version 6.3.10240]

Fresh install of Windows 10 and Take Command. I started Take Command, right clicked and pinned it to the Taskbar. Instead of pinning like most programs, it created a second "pinned" icon beside the running copy.

This seems to be a new behaviour to Windows 10, on Windows 8.1 I can pin properly. Nearly every other application I've tested will pin as expected.

 

[rconn]

TCC 18.00.29 x64 Windows 10 [Version 6.3.10240]

Fresh install of Windows 10 and Take Command. I started Take Command, right clicked and pinned it to the Taskbar. Instead of pinning like most programs, it created a second "pinned" icon beside the running copy.

This seems to be a new behaviour to Windows 10, on Windows 8.1 I can pin properly. Nearly every other application I've tested will pin as expected.

That's all on Windows; Take Command has no control or influence.

 

[thedave]

It does not happen on my Windows 8.1 installations. More importantly, the application is in control, and must take specific action to cause this to happen.

 

[rconn]

It does not happen on my Windows 8.1 installations. More importantly, the application is in control, and must take specific action to cause this to happen.

Nope. TCMD (and TCC) have never had any code to do this. TCMD *could* override the default Windows pinning behavior, but there doesn't seem to be any reason to do so.

 

[thedave]

Nope. TCMD (and TCC) have never had any code to do this. TCMD *could* override the default Windows pinning behavior, but there doesn't seem to be any reason to do so.

So why the difference? With nearly every other application, pinning it causes it to stay pinned. With TCMD, it does not.

 

[rconn]

I have no problems pinning TCMD to the taskbar in Windows 10 x64 build 10240.

Since:

1) It works in Windows 7
2) It works in Windows 8
3) There is no code in TCMD to handle pinning / unpinning (which has always been done by Windows; otherwise 99.9% of the other apps out there wouldn't be able to pin)
4) You're running a beta build of Windows 10

why are you convinced this is a TCMD issue? Have you tried contacting Microsoft? (Perhaps this is a Windows 10 "feature"?)

 

[thedave]

I'm convinced it's a TCMD issue because, at this time, I have exactly two applications with this behaviour, and the other one happens because it uses a Windows API to cause this behaviour. So with that being said, of the dozens of icons on my Taskbar, exactly one has this problem: TCMD.

 

[Charles Dye]

Have you tried creating your own shortcut to TCMD.EXE, and pinning that instead?

(No, I don't really know whether doing this will resolve your issue; I don't have Windows 10 yet myself. But the whole 'pinning' mechanism, at least from what I've seen of it in earlier versions of Windows, seems kind of strange and flakey and poorly documented.)

 

[rconn]

I'm convinced it's a TCMD issue because, at this time, I have exactly two applications with this behaviour, and the other one happens because it uses a Windows API to cause this behaviour. So with that being said, of the dozens of icons on my Taskbar, exactly one has this problem: TCMD.

What Windows API is the other app using?

I'm convinced it's a Windows 10 issue, because Windows 10 is behaving differently than Windows 7 or Windows 8 or Windows 8.1.

 

[vefatica]

I see two distinct behaviors from Windows 7 ... with TCMD or FireFox.

If the app is running and I "pin to taskbar" via its taskbar icon context menu, then that very icon becomes pinned and also later serves as the indicator that the app's running.

If I pin it by other means (the EXE's context menu or a shortcut's context menu) then the pinned icon serves only to start the app; instances of it are indicated by a separate icon.

 

[Asgeir]

This most likely does not help, but if I upgrade a Windows 8.1 machine to Windows 10 with the TCMD application already pinned, I only get one icon in the taskbar when the TCMD application is started.
On a fresh installation of Windows 10 I get two icons - one for the pinned TCMD and one for the running TCMD.

 

[Asgeir]

"Solved" it by copying the shortcut from the upgraded machine to the one with a fresh installation of Windows 10.
Must be something related to how the shortcut is created, but I don't know if it has something to do with Windows 10, TCMD or both.

 

[fromano]

This is more to support what Rex said, but I had completely different experience, in Windows 8.1 I had two icons pinned to the taskbar, a 64-bit and a 32-bit TCMD, when I started the 64-bit TCMD the 32-bit was lit up/activate but as the 64-bit TCMD running, after I upgraded to Windows 10, it started working correctly again, the 64-bit icon starts and lights up/activate the 64 bit icon pinned and the 32-bit one the 32-bit icon

 

[williamleara]

I'm running a production build of Win10 and I have the same problem. I've got a dozen different applications that I pin to the taskbar fine on the first attempt. Take Command 18 does not work.

I'm trying to add a command line parameter--don't know if that is part of the issue or not. My target is:
"C:\Program Files\JPSoft\TCMD18_x64\tcmd.exe" /@"C:\Users\<path>\TCMD.INI"

...to specify the .INI file to use.

 

[Alpengreis]

"Solved" it by copying the shortcut from the upgraded machine to the one with a fresh installation of Windows 10.
Must be something related to how the shortcut is created, but I don't know if it has something to do with Windows 10, TCMD or both.

I heard from that trick elsewhere. I tried with my Win 7 64-bit Icon, no success ...
this is a strange thing.

 

[williamleara]

I finally got it working by copying the shortcut from the %AppData%\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\User Pinned\TaskBar directory on a Win8.1 computer where it was pinned correctly.

Why it was working on the other machine, I don't know. It's not a problem of Win8.1 vs. Win10 -- I've had this problem on Win8.1 too.

Ironically, I did a binary compare of the old and new shortcuts and they're exactly the same. I think the mystery lies in the Registry key that also holds this data; the TaskBar directory under %APPDATA% is a red herring. Here's the key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Taskband

Exactly what the root cause is, I don't know, and I also don't know what it is about Take Command that causes this problem.

 

[Alpengreis]

I finally got it working by copying the shortcut from the %AppData%\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\User Pinned\TaskBar directory on a Win8.1 computer where it was pinned correctly.

Why it was working on the other machine, I don't know. It's not a problem of Win8.1 vs. Win10 -- I've had this problem on Win8.1 too.

Ironically, I did a binary compare of the old and new shortcuts and they're exactly the same. I think the mystery lies in the Registry key that also holds this data; the TaskBar directory under %APPDATA% is a red herring. Here's the key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Taskband

Exactly what the root cause is, I don't know, and I also don't know what it is about Take Command that causes this problem.

I'll investigate a bit, if I have enough time. Thanks for your details!

 

[Alpengreis]

Okay, even with those paths, I had no success (with a copy from Win 7 x64) ... (not yet checked the reg-key).

@williamleara
Could I be successful, if I copy the "good" LNK from you? If so, could you upload a zipped LNK here?

 

[Alpengreis]

BTW: I have checked now the reg-key "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Taskband" under the related user. Result: I have not found ANY interesting related data there. I have only the following keys:

Favorites, FavoritesChanges, FavoritesRemovedChanges, FavoritesResolve, FavoritesVersion

It seems, they are all not related to this misterious thing.

EDIT: Ah, okay, I found something in the Favorites Key, indeed!
EDIT2: AND also in the FavoritesResolve!

 

[mjoury]

I know this is a very old thread (nearly a year) and everyone probably has this solved by now, but...

I have seen this problem on some Win 10 machines and not others (or maybe I just went about "pinning" using the method below and forgot that I did this). Anyway, the solution seems to be simple. Rather than dragging the icon to the task bar or right click pinning it from the start menu, simply run Take Command and then "pin" the running icon by right clicking once it is already running on the taskbar. Seems to work fine after that.

BTW, I tried suggestion above to create my own shortcut and that did not work.

 

[Alpengreis]

No, I'm honest: I had this not been solved yet ...

And indeed this method works like a charm!

So, thank you very much for warming up!