Program installations cannot create new start menu shortcuts

I have a very weird problem, so weird that I've not been able to find even one single instance of anyone else experiencing it.

You know how when you install a new program on your system, typically at the end of installation the program will automatically create a program group and shortcuts in the start menu? Well for some reason programs cannot automatically create shortcuts.

Here's what typically happens... the install will be humming along fine then I'll get hit with errors:

"cannot create <shortcut>.lnk "

I'll get that error or something very similar (i.e. fail to create; etc) for as many shortcuts as it tried to create.

The program works fine, it's just it couldn't create shortcuts in the start menu for some perverse reason.

When I check the start menu, there will typically be a new folder created corresponding to the program, however the folder will contain *no shortcuts* and will be blank.

Now, if i manually try to create a shortcut and drop it in the start menu myself, I CAN do this.
It's just when programs try to do it that the problem occurs, it seems. It's limited only to shortcuts, too, as the install is able to create new folders.



Anyone have any idea why this might be occuring?



Also another possibly related problem... my quicklaunch bar settings are not saved on reboot. The icons rearrange to default and it refuses to stay open. This problem is more common, however none of the common issues behind it are causing it. I don't have the wsaupdater.exe issues, I don't have the nosavesettings key, etc.


If it helps these problems seemed to come about when I upgraded to xp2. I had lots of problems with it. For awhile explorer was crashing every time i right clicked but i figured out how to fix that (there was something in the shell that was screwing it up and i had to remove it from the menu with a program).

These two problems now just have me stumped. Any answers?

 

I just tried that now and it did a little scan but nothing came up.

 

Hello itsthewooo,

and it did a little scan
Did it ask for the XP cd?

Regards - Charles

 

For future reference how do i access event viewer?

And no, it did not unfortunately resolve the problem

 

yes it did, but it did not resolve the problem unfortunately.

 

Hi
No there is no security tab listed. Just general, sharing, and customize tabs.

By the way, other computers on my home network cannot browse the contents of my C drive even though I've shared it and made all files available. I can browse THEIR drives but they cannot browse my root drive (just certain folders like shared, or other folders within c that I manually tell it to share).

Perhaps all these problems are related?

 

Hi again
Thanks Pete C for telling me how to see the security tab

YES there is a user system. There is also myself, and "Administrators ".

All of us have all permissions checked except special permissions... HOWEVER they are greyed out with a little check box. Meaning, I can't check or uncheck them, they're just grayed out with a check in them by default.

Let me show you what I mean...
click here to see screen capture

Is that OK?