Some documents not opening with double-click?

[john1857]

I have Textpadassociateed with many things, including XSLT stylesheets (.xsl). In most cases when I double-click an associated document (e.g. a .txt file) it opens as expected, but for .xsl files it just opens Textpad with no document, like so:

tp3.JPG (12.02 KiB) Viewed 16992 times

The same thing happens if I right-click, select "Open with..." and then choose Textpad. My settings look like this:

tp1.JPG (14.31 KiB) Viewed 16993 times

The icon is also not a Textpad icon:

tp2.JPG (3.53 KiB) Viewed 16993 times

I can however right-click and select "Open with Textpad", and that works.
Any idea what I can do to fix this?

[Mr. Code Monkey]

Double-clicking .xsl files works fine for me.

But I don't know if those DOS commands work (the same way) in Windows 11. I get:

Code: Select all

C:\>assoc .xsl
.xsl=xslfile

C:\>ftype xslfile
File type 'xslfile' not found or no open command associated with it.

Go to Windows Settings -> Apps > Default apps

Verify or set:
.

assoc settings.png (25.76 KiB) Viewed 13308 times

What versions of everything are you using? (Mine is Win 11, 24H2 | TextPad 9.8.0)

[john1857]

This is what I see:

tp1.JPG (10.16 KiB) Viewed 13297 times

Running TextPad 8.22.0 (64 bit) on Windows 11 24H2 (Build 26100.3775)

[Mr. Code Monkey]

Well then I got nothing, sorry. Did you restart after applicable changes?

Some possible gambles:

1. Upgrade to 9.8.0
2. Uninstall IE, if present. (That looks like an IE icon)
3. Poke around in the registry if you are comfortable doing that.

[john1857]

Well then I got nothing, sorry. Did you restart after applicable changes?

Yes. Thsi has been going on for a while. I hoped upgrading to 8.22 wuld fix it, but it didn't.

Some possible gambles:

1. Upgrade to 9.8.0
2. Uninstall IE, if present. (That looks like an IE icon)
3. Poke around in the registry if you are comfortable doing that.

1. Will try it, but I've been avoiding v9 (I dislike the new UI)
2. I have Edge, not IE, and of course MS won't let me uninstall it...
3. I'm comfortable if I know what it is I'm poking...

Something interesting:

tp1.JPG (19.83 KiB) Viewed 13258 times

tp2.JPG (22.99 KiB) Viewed 13258 times

I tried adding an OpenWithList key to mimic the one for .txt:

tp3.JPG (18.31 KiB) Viewed 13258 times

but that didn't work either. So no idea what I should do.

[bbadmin]

Try making the registry entries for .xsl the same as those for .xslt and check that they then behave the same way. After that, assign .xsl to TextPad in Default Apps.

[john1857]

No effect.
However, I just installed 9.8 instead of 8.22, created an empty .xsl file on my desktop, and it opens successfully (despite silly IE-style icon).
Something interesting -- with 9.8, I get the same blank document behaviour trying to open a .txt file on an external disk.
So I've uninstalled 9.8 (because I can downgrade) and reinstalled 8.22. Despite uninstalling, it remembered all my settings, so if I've got a settings problem then nothing has changed.

[bbadmin]

TextPad 8 and 9 store their settings in XML files in subfolders 8 or 9 of %APPDATA%\Helios\TextPad. File associations are stored in the registry, so that File Explorer knows which application to start and how to invoke it to open a file.

The installer for TextPad creates this key in the registry:

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HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\TextPad.exe

Under it is the information File Explorer needs to make TextPad open a file. It uses DDE messages which the correct version of TextPad receives because of this entry:

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HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\TextPad.exe\shell\open\ddeexec\application\

Under it is either "TextPad.8" or "TextPad.9", as appropriate.

If TextPad is started but does not open a file, it is because it is not receiving the DDE messages. Try uninstalling TextPad then deleting this key if it still exists:

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HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\TextPad.exe

Then log off to close File Explorer, log on again and install the version you want to use and the entries under that key will be created appropriately.

[john1857]

That seems to have done the trick. I had to manually delete %appdata%\Helios and then reconfigure after reinstalling, but it least it remembered my registration details. Thanks.