Programs and .jpg file associations

Factual Questions
1

There is a neverending turf war on my hard drive over who gets hegemony over the .jpg files. I swear every new program that comes along wants to lay exclusive claim to them and hijacks them for its very own. Next thing you know, all the .jpg icons have been colonized, as though the new program has planted its flag on them.

The other day one of my kids installed a new game that uses Quicktime, and now all the .jpgs on my hard drive have the Quicktime icon. For a long time after installing Adobe Photoshop, all the .jpgs had been flying the Photoshop flag (meaning that if you clicked one, the Photoshop program started up to display it).

Questions:

  1. How do you undo this file association colonization?
  2. Which program is the best one to associate for starting up .jpgs?
2
  1. Open Windows Explorer.
  2. Open Tools > Folder Options > File Types.
  3. Select JPEG and click ‘Change’. Select the program you would like.

As to which the best choice is, it depends if you want to view them or edit them, I suppose. There’s nothing wrong with Paint or Photo Viewer (or even IrfanView freeware) if you just want something fast-loading and simple.

3

I use ACDSee, but just like you, any new installer, if you’re not careful, will nab your files immediately, often without asking.

Some do ask, though, so you’ve just got to not get used to clicking “next, next, next” during installation of some apps.

4

The simplest way is to select a file, then hold down shift and right-click it. Click “Open With…”. Then select the program you want to open it with, and check the “always use this program for files of this type” box.

5

Sounds like a hell of a good argument for separate File Type and File Creator flags to me.

6

Ahunter3, you sound like a Mac user.

And I don’t mean that as a challenge. Just a comment. :wink:

7

Jomo-

One other thing. Most (well written) applications have a setting somewhere in the options that says something like “maintain file associations” or “reclaim file associations”.

They should not be auto-reclaiming every time you execute.

8

I fixed the file associations so that all the .jpgs now run Photoshop when clicked. That works fine, but it wasn’t my real problem.

I reset the icons to be the Photoshop “jpeg” icon. However, in Windows Explorer and My Computer they still stubbornly show the Quicktime icon.

Worst of all, my real problem, is that the preview capability is still disabled. You know, in Windows Explorer or My Computer, in the view menu, you set it “View as web page.” Then when you select an image file, its preview displays in the left margin. It still works for .gifs and other image file types. But no amount of tweaking I have tried will bring back the .jpg preview. HELP!

(I may have to resort to the BBQ Pit to express my thoughts about Quicktime.) :mad:

9

I think the best graphics viewing program ever is VuePrint. Space bar cycles through all the pictures in a directory or a zip file, single keystroke commands to do everything, etc. It’s great, the interface is exactly what a file viewer should be, and it works. It even includes a screensaver to display your pictures.

Shareware.

10

From either Windows Explorer, or My Computer, simply click “View” then select “Thumbnails”.

You may want to do this with each folder that contains graphics files, and then select “Tools”, “Folder Options”, then select the “View” tab, and in the window that is displayed, make sure the item listed as “Remember each folder’s view settings” is checked.

And btw, I am quite sure, when you install Quicktime, it does ask you which files you would like to associate with it.

11

I have a similar question, but the answers so far don’t help. I have WinXP, and I want it to open the picture with IrfanView when I double-click the file in Explorer. IrfanView has set itself up to be the application that handles the “Open” command in Explorer. However, the “Preview” command is the default, so when you double-click the file, it does a Preview, not an Open, and another program (Windows Picture and Fax Viewer) has Preview.

If I go to Explorer’s File Types box, the only action listed is “Open,” and IrfanView has that. How do I get rid of Preview, or at least make Open the default?

12

That takes a registry edit, CurtC. All the details are here…

http://www.annoyances.org/exec/show/article03-201

13

That takes a registry edit, CurtC. All the details are here…

http://www.annoyances.org/exec/show/article03-201

14

I went into Explorer/My Computer, and fiddled with the file settings in “Tools > Folder Options > File Types” until there were no more possibilities to try. I reset the icons for the .jpgs, I reset the .jpg settings in the root directory C:, and in other directories where I keep .jpgs.

I got drastic and uninstalled every bit of Quicktime from my hard drive. I removed the Quicktime file associations. Finally the Quicktime monster is slain, but the damage it wrought remains.

AZCowboy, I don’t know what OS you’re running, but I’m using Windows98. I found no “Thumbnails” on the View menu, or anywhere at all, in Windows Explorer/My Computer, so I was unable to carry out your advice.

If I had installed Quicktime myself, I would have been careful not to let this problem happen. But my kids did it when I was away.

How do I restore the preview for .jpgs?

15

In this case you should probably direct most of your anger towards MicroSoft. I happen to think that MS does most things pretty well, but their approach to associating file types with applications is a convoluted, counter-intuitive mess. I’m surprised no enterprising third party has come up with a replacement.

16

In this case you should probably direct most of your anger towards MicroSoft. I happen to think that MS does most things pretty well, but their approach to associating file types with applications is a convoluted, counter-intuitive mess. I’m surprised no enterprising third party has come up with a replacement.

17

Sorry, Jomo Mojo, my instructions were for Win2K, not Win 98.

I went back to one of my older machines running Win98, and I couldn’t find anything in the GUI that controls this function. Personally, I hate the “view as a webpage” “feature”, and never use it. But I can understand how you want it back.

It looks like the answer to your problem can be found here.

It involves a registry edit, and if that is not something you are real comfortable with, I would first suggest that you run Windows Update, and update both your OS and your browser, if they are not current versions. It is not likely to make editing the registry any easier, but it just might solve the problem. You might also notice that the paragraph as the bottom of the linked page says that the Internet Explorer Repair Tool fixes this problem.

On the other hand, if you are comfortable modifying the registry, it looks to be a quick fix.

Good Luck.

18

Continues to sound like a hell of a good argument for separate File Type and File Creator flags to me.

19

Tell me more about these File Type and File Creator flags. How do they work?

20

Short version: Each file contains two different codes.

One code tells the operating system and every program on your computer what kind of file it is, so that those programs know that this is a file that they can open. For example, file type=JPEG means that Photoshop, Netscape, FileMaker’s “Insert Picture” dialog, your operating system’s “Wallpaper” or “Desktop Picture” setting, and any other program that has a use for a JPEG would recognize it as an appropriate file, whereas your MP3 player would know to grey it out in “File-Open” dialog boxes because it doesn’t do JPEGs.

The second code, the File Creator, tells the operating system what specific program “owns” that particular file. If you double-click the file or otherwise open the file without specifying a program to open it with, the second code determines what program will open the file. Three JPEG files sitting side-by-side in a folder could be: a Photoshop file that you’re in the midst of doing edits on; a Dreamweaver graphic for your web site; and a picture of your cousin’s kitty cat that opens in your lightweight fast-launching picture browser.

Installing a new program (e.g, QuickTime) would no longer “steal” the associations of all your existing files, because each file on an individual level has a File Creator association. It might steal your operating system’s DEFAULT setting (i.e., for JPEG files that don’t have a File Creator code use QuickTime etc) but files designated as Photoshop files would remain Photoshop files; files designated as Internet Explorer JPEGS would remain Internet Explorer JPEGS; and so on.

The Mac operating system uses File Type and Creator codes but it hides them too well, making it difficult to change the creator codes if you want to change them without adding 3rd party software. (The thinkng seems to be that newbies won’t want to mess with it and experts will find and use the 3rd party s/w but it still strikes me as stupid not to incorporate a place to change the flags right into the File Info window).

The newer Mac OS (MacOS X) uses a 2nd-generation version of File Type and File Creator: each file contains a binding key for File Type and File Creator, and the File Creator binding key is sophisticated enough to bind a file to one specific installed version of a program even if you have multiple copies installed (i.e, you can make a JPEG a Photoshop 7 JPEG or a Photoshop 6 JPEG if you have both versions installed on your computer). Again, you don’t get full access to these choices without the aid of 3rd party software, and again I think that’s silly and annoying.

MacOS X and the earlier versions of MacOS both have ways of treating files that have extensions but not File Types or Creators–for files like these, it works more like a PC does, with one program associated with each extension. So the fallback for files that don’t have the codes, your operating system still has a clue about what to do with the files if you double-click on them. But the behavior based on file extension alone gets overriden by the codes if the codes are present.