Solved How can I change an application's icon?

QuicktellPro said:

...and in the manual recommendation, I made the change as suggested but the icon for all text files remains the original notepad++ version, even after reboot.

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So did this actually work and it was the rebuild of the cache was needed to apply the change?

Mooly said:

rebuild of the cache was needed to apply the change?

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I just restarted Explorer.

Mooly said:

So did this actually work and it was the rebuild of the cache was needed to apply the change?

Click to expand...

Yes.

Interesting, thanks.

Glad you managed to fix the issue this way.
There's another trick which should work too:
Go to the > Settings > Apps > Default apps > Choose default values by file type > ...scroll down till you find ".txt" and apply the same program, it should refresh the dependent icons.


Thanks for introducing me to this app.

QuicktellPro said:

Edit: I found it! It was called Sib Icon Replacer. I don't know whether it will still work with Windows 11 because it doesn't appear to have been updated since Vista.

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...which replaces the ResourceHacker job in an easier way. Though, I don't know if you can actually preview all the separate dimensions used, in order to replace correctly the icon, or if it is not that a problem when there are a few differences (explained).

There are area specific 'layers', one for an icon, one for the Taskbar, one for the Title Bar, etc...

Indeed...

Edwin said:

There are area specific 'layers', one for an icon, one for the Taskbar, one for the Title Bar, etc...

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(Depending on System scale) :

Task Bar : 24 or 32
Star Menu : 32
Pinned icons in Start Menu : small 20 or 40 / big 24 or 48
Classic Shell Start Menu /All programs : 16
Desktop : 48
Explorer : 16 / 32 / 48 / 256
John Travolta is searching for : 64

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...but the thing to be aware here is if the new icon group(s) contain the same dimensions of the one to replace.
Some apps such as 7zip use icons with just 256 48 32 & 16 but with an extra 96x96 I had to create (something like that).
I never tried replacing an original icon group having these particular dimensions, with a standard 8 dimensions icon. Could work as well...

TizianoMad said:

...which replaces the ResourceHacker job in an easier way. Though, I don't know if you can actually preview all the separate dimensions used, in order to replace correctly the icon, or if it is not that a problem when there are a few differences (explained).

Click to expand...

That's why I said I wasn't sure it would still work with Win 11 as it hasn't seen any updates since Vista. However, I did try it and although, visually, you only get to see a single icon, it does seem to have replaced all sizes right up to 256x256.

Dism.exe /online /Export-DefaultAppAssociations:C:\DefaultAssoc.xml

abactuon said:

Dism.exe /online /Export-DefaultAppAssociations:C:\DefaultAssoc.xml

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What are you supposed to do with this file once exported?

See which extensions are processed by which program.

Example

File 'test.404' is not tied to programs (unknown).





Let's tie it to Firefox






Let's change it in the Windows registry.

Example
Creating entries in the Windows registry to work with .cfg files using the program SciTE
Perhaps you already have this and then you need to change 'DefaultIcon'




# .cfg
If (!(Test-Path "HKCR:\.cfg")) {
New-Item -Path "HKCR:\.cfg" -Force
}
If (!(Test-Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\DefaultIcon")) {
New-Item -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\DefaultIcon" -Force
}
Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\DefaultIcon" -Name "(Default)" -Type ExpandString -Value "$ExtLibraryIcons,-38" -Force
Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCR:\.cfg" -Name "(Default)" -Type String -Value "SciTE.cfg" -Force
Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg" -Name "(Default)" -Type String -Value "File .cfg" -Force
If (!(Test-Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\Shell\Open\Command")) {
New-Item -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\Shell\Open\Command" -Force
}
Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\Shell\Open" -Name "FriendlyAppName" -Type String -Value "SciTE" -Force
Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKCR:\SciTE.cfg\Shell\Open\Command" -Name "(Default)" -Type String -Value '"C:\Program Files\Portable\wscite\SciTE.exe" "%1"'-Force

Seems rather complicated. As I already stated, I solved the issue by using Sib Icon Replacer. I'm only an intermediate user so registry editing gives me the heebie-jeebies. Thanks for your input anyway.