Pinning Settings app to taskbar stores control.exe instead

Tom,

Make you own Settings shortcut and pin that to the Taskbar instead.

Set the shortcut's Properties, Target to
explorer.exe ms-settings:

I've just tested this and it behaves correctly when pinned to the Taskbar.

All the best,
Denis

Hello @tom11,

As Try3 [ Denis ] has stated, this does indeed work correctly. It also works if you use the same method and logic to add it to a Customised Toolbar, which is what I have and use.

I hope this helps.

tom11 said:

The selfmade icon does not turn "active" in itself, when I open the Settings windows. Instead, there appears a second (blank) icon after all taskbar icons.

Yes, it does show an additional entry when you open it. Many Taskbar pinned items do.
I don't know why it's "blank". Perhaps it is not blank but white upon a pale colour that you cannot make out against your own Taskbar's colour. Here is what I see on my dark green Taskbar

tom11 said:

(And in case I pin the blank icon to the taskbar, it turns out to be ... control.exe). Seemingly there exists a kind of forwarding from SystemSettings.exe to Control.exe . But I will tolerate this little flaw.

I do not understand this behaviour at all.
I just tried it myself and it remains Settings not ControlPanel.
Perhaps you have customised something in the Registry in the past that makes this happen. Or perhaps a third-party utility has done so.

Denis

Denis,

glad you confirm this is exotic behavior. I never saw it anywhere else. It appeared after Windows Disk Cleanup, no third party on board. (But no worries, this is only a test installation of the most recent regular Windows 10 for exploring the Linux subsystem).

Many thanks again for your commitment.
All the best, Tom

- - - Updated - - -

Finally got it: A selfmade shortcut with target "explorer.exe ms-settings:" requires that in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs, there is a shortcut with target "%windir%\System32\Control.exe", path "%HOMEDRIVE%%HOMEPATH%" and attributes RSA. Then it will work as expected without the nasty effect I described above. (I tested this solution - though I do not understand its "logic".)

All the best,
Tom

Tom,
I am also baffled.

I have the C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Settings.lnk shortcut [Target %windir%\System32\Control.exe] as well and I do not understand how its existence can alter the behaviour of pinning another shortcut to the Taskbar.

I noticed one additional aspect of pinning that shortcut to the Taskbar. Unlike all the other pinned shortcuts, it does not get listed in
C:\Users\%UserName%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch\User Pinned\TaskBar

In case it was something peculiar to the folder C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs, I pinned its Edge shortcut to the Taskbar and it does appear in the …..\Quick Launch\User Pinned\TaskBar list.

A mystery unsolved,
All the best,
Denis