problem w/ Excel shortcuts
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Thread: problem w/ Excel shortcuts

  1. #1
    Join Date
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    problem w/ Excel shortcuts

    There's a certain Excel file I access a lot. I've pinned it in my Excel menu, but I'd like to make it easier.

    With my various other programs, Notepad, Word, even Firefox, I can click on their instances in the taskbar and drag upwards, which gives me various files I can access. However when I click on Excel and drag it upwards it only gives me 3 options:
    - Microsoft Excel 2007
    - Pin this program to taskbar
    - Close window

    Excel is also in my start menu, but as you can see in the picture below, it doesnt have an arrow to drilldown while the rest of the programs do. What gives?

    Excel.png

    Thanks!
    Dan

    PS - what are those areas of the start menu called, the one which i highlighted in the pic, the left side above the bar, and the right side?

  2. #2
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    Possibly useful link:

    http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/w...9-79dfddd46365

    Option 2:

    Place a shortcut to the file on the Desktop.

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by jdc2000 View Post
    Possibly useful link:


    Place a shortcut to the file on the Desktop.
    And then drag it to the taskbar to pin it
    If you're happy and you know it......it's your meds.

  4. #4
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    thanks folks. yes i could do the shortcut, and may actually do so, but was hoping to figure out what the actual problem with excel is

  5. #5
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    The left panel of the Start Menu is for recently used programs. The arrow to the right of apps is for recent documents aka the Jump List.

    This might help with that:
    http://www.mydigitallife.info/fix-wi...-pinned-files/

  6. #6
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    Officially you can only pin an application to the Taskbar but not a folder or a file.
    Here is a trick:
    1. Right click on the Excel file and select "Send to" then "Desktop (create Shortcut)"
    2. Right click on the newly created shortcut and select "Properties"
    3. In the "Target" section under the "Shortcut" tab, you will see the path to the Excel file.
    4. Add "C:\Windows\explorer.exe" - w/o the quotation marks - in front of the path of the Excel file and make sure you leave a space between them.
    5. The resulting entry should look like this:
      Code:
      C:\Windows\explorer.exe Drive:\Folder\Subfolder\the_Excel_file
    6. Click "Apply"
    7. Optional: Click "Change Icon" to change the shortcut icon if you want - otherwise the shortcut icon will become the generic icon used for folders.
    8. Click "OK"
    9. Right click on the shortcut again and select "Pin to Taskbar"

    Once pinned, you can trash the shortcut on the Desktop.
    Last edited by falcon2000; March 9th, 2013 at 07:17 PM.

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by Steve R Jones View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by jdc2000 View Post
    Option 2:

    Place a shortcut to the file on the Desktop.
    And then drag it to the taskbar to pin it
    That works too, but, when you try to pin just the shortcut w/o the modification outlined in my post above, it will actually pin the Excel program to the Taskbar (with the Excel file in turn pinned to Excel program) rather than the specific Excel file itself. So what happen is when you click on the pinned Excel icon in the Taskbar, you will see not only the specific pinned Excel file but also a list of the recently opened Excel files. You then select from there which one to open. If the shortcut to the file is modified as stated, then, one click and you will directly open the specific Excel file by itself w/o having to choose from a list. It works either way - I guess it depends on how convenient you want it to be.

  8. #8
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    Correction

    There should be quotation marks for the path of the Excel file:
    Code:
    C:\Windows\explorer.exe "Drive:\Folder\Subfolder\the_Excel_file"

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