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In many Windows programs when I open a file, the GUI dialogue that starts with "Look in:" and provides a list of directories and files to open has a thin panel on the left-hand side with the following 5 icons:

  • Recent Places
  • Desktop
  • Libraries
  • Computer
  • Network

Is there a Registry Hack available for adding my own icons to this? I wish to add three for various folders related to the work that I do, and I haven't been able to find a way to customize this.

Thanks in advance.

enter image description here

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2 Answers

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See if you can tweak them with these instructions. This will only affect dialogs with the places bar on the side like the one you're displaying here. http://windowsxp.mvps.org/PlacesBar.htm

For other dialogs with the folder list on the side, Mehper's answer should work, but Opera isn't using that.

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That's a great link to some excellent information, thanks! The Windows Registry key they're working with there doesn't exist in Windows 7, but then again those are instructions for Windows XP. – Randolf Richardson Mar 6 '11 at 15:48
Hm, I figured the registry key would exist though TweakUI wouldn't work. Were you able to use group policy to do it? Anyway thanks for the attempt at the upvote, you surely have reputation for it but maybe it's some other odd restriction. – Mark Sowul Mar 6 '11 at 16:04
(I upvoted this answer, finally, now that upvotes are working; there was a technical problem with my login to this site at the time the upvote feature wasn't working for me. Thanks to the many moderators who assisted me with this in Meta.) – Randolf Richardson Aug 9 '11 at 17:54
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Ha, wow, glad you finally got it straightened out – Mark Sowul Aug 10 '11 at 17:04
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Upvoting stuff is fun! – Randolf Richardson Aug 10 '11 at 17:06
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1) From within Windows Explorer, select Organize > Folder and Search Options. (Alternately, open the Control Panel and select Folder Options.)

2) On the General tab, in the Navigation Pane section, check the Show All Folders option, and click OK.

enter image description here

3) Now it's actually quite easy to add items to the Favorites section in the Navigation Pane. From within Windows Explorer, navigate to and open the folder you want to display in the Favorites list.

4) Right-click the Favorites item in the Navigation Pane and select Add Current Location to Favorites. (To delete an item from the Favorites list, right-click it and select Remove.)

enter image description here

That's all.

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I'm not asking about Favourites, but about a different part of the File->Open GUI that appears in most Windows programs. – Randolf Richardson Mar 6 '11 at 15:51
@Randolf Richardson: My solution works for File >Open GUI. I've just tested it on Firefox' Open GUI. It should also work for other Windows programs as well. – Mehper C. Palavuzlar Mar 6 '11 at 17:49
That works for some programs, but there are others that seem to be using the same GUI function that Opera uses. Five examples are Adobe Photoshop CS4 Extended, Microsoft Office PowerPoint Viewer 2007, Adobe Reader 9, NetBeans IDE 7, and SpyBot Search & Destroy. I think there must be two different File->Open dialogues, and between the two of us we're discussing both of them. Your solution works for the one that I'm not asking about. – Randolf Richardson Mar 9 '11 at 2:18
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