add-remove programs won't list

[Guest]

this one's got me-- i go to remove a program & now they will not list, just
stays blank. For me this is a first, please help me out if anyone can-- thanx

 

[Malke]

this one's got me-- i go to remove a program & now they will not list, just
stays blank. For me this is a first, please help me out if anyone can-- thanx

Add/Remove Programs does not populate - Start>Run>regsvr32 appwiz.cpl
[enter]


Malke

 

[cquirke (MVP Windows shell/user)]

On Sun, 27 May 2007 03:23:01 -0700, tekj2000

this one's got me-- i go to remove a program & now they will not list, just
stays blank. For me this is a first, please help me out if anyone can-- thanx

I see something like this, and it's not a simple matter of "not
populating". What one sees is:
- a series of entries, as you'd expect, at the top of the list
- a long blank space, several scroll-downs in length
- the rest of the entries, to the end of the list

I've seen this on a few PCs, and there's no pattern to it, except that
if the bug is present, it is always present from then on, presumably
for the life of the installation.

Specifically, the long gap does not always follow or precede a
particular entry in the list.

Anyone else seeing this?

--------------- ----- ---- --- -- - - -

Error Messages Are Your Friends

 

[Malke]

On Sun, 27 May 2007 03:23:01 -0700, tekj2000


I see something like this, and it's not a simple matter of "not
populating". What one sees is:
- a series of entries, as you'd expect, at the top of the list
- a long blank space, several scroll-downs in length
- the rest of the entries, to the end of the list

I've seen this on a few PCs, and there's no pattern to it, except that
if the bug is present, it is always present from then on, presumably
for the life of the installation.

Specifically, the long gap does not always follow or precede a
particular entry in the list.

Anyone else seeing this?

These are actually two different issues. Add/Remove Programs not
populating at all is usually cured with the fix I already gave. The
large blank is a very old and well-known issue.

MVP Kelly Theriot has lots of Add/Remove Programs issues at her website.
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_abc.htm

From David Candy:

HKEY LOCAL MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall
Look under here in the registry; one of the icons has a negative number.
Change it to a positive; most files have a 1 icon. Windows will try to
guess the icon if you remove the entry altogether.

If that does not apply to your situation, then download MVP Ramesh's
script below and run it. This script lists all the negative icon
references present in the registry, and sends them to a log file.

Script - http://windowsxp.mvps.org/utils/ARPNegCheck.vbs
(Lists all negative icon references in Add/Remove)

Technical details at The Old New Thing : Why does Add or Remove Programs
show a large blank space?:
http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/05/26/422076.aspx


Malke

 

[cquirke (MVP Windows shell/user)]

cquirke (MVP Windows shell/user) wrote:

These are actually two different issues. The large blank is a
very old and well-known issue.

Ah thanks; I'd been wondering about the "large blank" thing!

MVP Kelly Theriot has lots of Add/Remove Programs issues at her website.
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_abc.htm

From David Candy:

HKEY LOCAL MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall
Look under here in the registry; one of the icons has a negative number.

Technical details at The Old New Thing : Why does Add or Remove Programs
show a large blank space?:

http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/05/26/422076.aspx

From that site, it appears that positive values will bug the same way,
if they don't resolve to an icon image within the file (or perhaps if
the file is not found). For example, an icon index of 15 won't work
if the file's resources only hold 6 icons.

Also from that site, the writer asks...

"Perhaps the Add or Remove Programs control panel should be more
tolerant of invalid icon registrations? Or should it stay the way it
is, adhering to the "Don't bend over backwards to fix buggy programs;
force the program authors to fix their own bugs" policy that so many
of my readers advocate? "

....to which I'd reply: Icon index is an input parameter, and all input
parameters should be sanity-checked. Exploitabiliy of icon handling
is nasty, and we've already had one such even already.