Right click 'Open With' Command missing. Help Please.

Anonymous
2009-09-21T20:08:24+00:00

I realised a few days ago that the right click context menu 'open with' command is missing. However its there at the top of the window on the 'menu bar' or whatever.

Not sure how it happened. Maybe when i installed MS .Net Framework 3 SP1 or maybe when I cleaned registry with CCleaner.

I need to get it back please. Could u tell me how??? thanks.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments
Answer accepted by question author
Anonymous
2009-09-22T12:20:29+00:00

Hi, scurvy:

By design, the Open With menu option is not available when you right-click executable files (.cmd, .bat, .pif, .scf, .exe, .com, or .scr), or shortcuts to executable files.

If you've lost the Open With menu option for ALL file types, including non-executable files, follow this steps:

  1. Click Start, All Programs, Accesories, Notepad.
  2. Copy and paste this text:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\*\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\Open With]

@="{09799AFB-AD67-11d1-ABCD-00C04FC30936}"

  1. Click File, Save As, name the file "OpenWith.reg" (WITH THE QUOTATION MARKS) and click OK.
  2. Now double-click OpenWith.reg, click Continue, Yes, OK, and see if the problem is solved.

P.S: My personal advice is not to use ANY registry cleaner on the system.

Microsoft MVP Windows Desktop Experience

Was this answer helpful?

100+ people found this answer helpful.
0 comments

100 additional answers

Sort by: Most helpful
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2013-04-09T13:50:48+00:00

    WOW!!! it worked perfect on my end... Thank you. And also for the good adice on registry cleaning.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2013-03-28T21:10:56+00:00

    Programs like CC usually have an undo feature.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2013-03-28T20:35:58+00:00

    Applied this fix to my registry, and it did "take" -- but it didn't solve the problem.  My right-click menus on all files shows "Open With ..."  rather than "Open With" with a submenu caret. 

    In my case, there's a related issue:  if you click the "Open With ..." menu item, it gets you to a dialog box allowing selection of applications you can add to the Open With list.  But that list is always wrong, as the file extension has a quotation mark added at the end (e.g., file.txt is shown as file.txt" in the Open With selector dialog).

    When I select a program in that Open With dialog, it does NOT go into the open-with list for either the original file extension (in the example, .txt) or the new fake one (in the example, .txt")...so the original "Open With..." menu item never does the right thing.

    Ideas?????

    This is clearly caused by CC's registry cleaner ... sigh...

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2013-03-19T01:53:31+00:00

    Thank you very much.  This worked for me perfectly.

    Regards,

    John

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments