How can I get a file type to show up as a desired icon of that file rather than an overlay of the program that opens it?
I have .pdf files that are showing as no icons just blank white files, while the edit file type in customize is showing the adobe pdf icon.
Also, can someone figure out how to create document icons indicating the file type rather than the program that opens it?
Example:
My books are opened with the Calibre viewer (Calibre book software) the book files are in .mobi, .epub, .pdf, and .azw3. Is it possible to have each file icon be what the file type is rather than them all having the Calibre icon? Sometimes it does, and other times, even if the icon is showing in the edit file type it won't.
File types can be confusing since they can be overridden in various ways, e.g. via Open With. Its up to whichever program is handling double-clicks on the file type to decide which icon they get. You can change it via the registry (in most cases) but it can take a bit of digging, and it may also be undone when a piece of software is updated, or a new (e.g.) PDF tool is installed and tries to take over the file type.
If you only care about the icons in Opus and not the rest of Windows, then you could create a wildcard filter which e.g. gives *.pdf files the icon of your choice. You'd need to find or make the icon that you wanted, but making Opus show it for a given file extension is fairly easy.
Here is a super easy way to do what you are asking for. If you have an icon that you want to be shown for .PDf files, place that icon in a folder (for example, C:\Icons).
Then do the following:
Copy the full pathname of the icon - for example, C:\Icons\PDF Files.ico
Open the File Types Editor
When it opens, simply type PDF - the editor will scroll down to the PDF entry.
Press ENTER, then click on the “Change Icon” button.
Paste your icon's full pathname (C:\Icons\PDF Files.ico) in the edit box next to “File:”
Click OK, then click OK again, then Close. You may need to exit out of Directory Opus, then restart it in order for the change to take effect.
NOTE: If Directory Opus doesn't show your custom icon after exiting and restarting Directory Opus, you can refresh your computer's icon cache using Winaero Tweaker, which you can get here: https://winaero.com/comment.php?comment.news.1836
Once it's installed, run Winaero Tweaker and go to Tools > Reset Icon Cache
Click on the “Reset Icon Cache” button. This should make your custom icon be shown for PDF files.
That won't work if the icon isn't the one from the file type, unfortunately. (e.g. If the file type itself is being overridden by Open With). It sounds like that is the case from the first post.
Using a label, as in my previous post, is an easy way to change the icons for *.pdf files or something else in situations where editing the filetype doesn't get you there, if you only care about the icons within Opus.
Something I forgot to mention is you also need to set up the label itself, which is where the icon is defined:
I have been trying to figure out what Leo had suggested, but it had nothing to do with icons, so I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. Although, I had come across other associations I had made in the past, so I deleted those because I suspect they were the reason for the problems.
I will try resetting the icon cache because the other steps Some Young Guy suggested are exactly what I have been doing.
Ok, that makes sense. SO what you are suggesting (if I only care about DO icons) is to go through the types of files I need to fix the icons, create an overall label to assign them. Example: e-book file types .epub, .azw3, .azw, .mobi,.prc, .fb2 - would all be assigned the label "Calibre Books" then going into the label I can create a rule that associates within that lable an icon designated to a specified file as directed by *.azw3 - or whatever.
Wait, I have no clue really how to do wildcards, and I should by now. What I have to ask is what is it that is being conveyed when you type in *.(bak|psd)? Is this where I should type *(azw3|epub|azw|mobi) - or what I am thinking is that every item in that particular group is represented by the extension followed by a bar to separate?
Also is there a way of using files other than icons? I my problem is that converting some .jpg to .icon results in squares. I want to create icons with a more A4 paper size and make them all standard.
As you can see on the left, there are .azw files that are shown with the Kindle icon overlayed on the "file" standard icon. Since the Kindle app opens the file. I want to use the icon that came with the app. So now I have the lable set, I'm not sure what to do from here.
The is a program called Quick_Any2Ico which lets you drag-and-drop a .jpg file onto the program executable, which then creates icons out of the .jpg image (.png files too). Quick_Any2Ico can create icons in sizes ranging from 16x16 up to 512x512.
You know what? I forgot I have Nirsoft on my computer. I opened FileTypesMan v1.83, and discovered that somehow my icons that should have been used all had filepaths that ended with .icon0
Fixed it, and now everything is how it should be. I have no idea how those ".icon0" got added, but I can now go through and fix it and it will appear in Windows and Opus.
