Battling Microsoft over Desktop Icons

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I read Paula Sharick's "Service Pack 5 Good News and Bad News" in the June 8, 1999, Windows NT Magazine UPDATE newsletter about SP5 rearranging all the desktop icons when you log on. I encountered this problem with SP4 and logged a support call to Microsoft. The support staff told me this bug was a known problem and closed the call on me. I requested to have my call reopened, and I wanted to know what Microsoft planned to do about the problem because I have approximately 45 icons on my desktop (I design PC boards and have a folder on my desktop for each job I work on). The support staff said they weren't planning to do anything because the problem had no workaround.

This problem only occurs if you have one of the icons on the desktop that is an actual folder and not a shortcut. Unfortunately 90 percent of my icons are actual folders. According to Microsoft, you simply move the folders on your desktop to a directory on your hard disk and then create shortcuts on your desktop. So instead of reducing the amount of work by making it easier, Microsoft has added two steps and created more work for the user.

During the support call via the Web, the support staff closed my call three times without my approval. I ended up talking with the manager on duty to get the call opened again. In the end, they kept sending me hotfixes to load, telling me to back up everything because there are no guarantees. In my opinion, if the support staff was successful in duplicating my problem (which they were), they should have performed the hotfixes at their facility and not wasted my time performing their research and development. To make a long story short, I didn't have time to test the hotfixes, so Microsoft ended up closing the support call with no plans to correct the problem. Wasn't Microsoft's original claim that Windows is easier to use because of the ability to have files and folders on your desktop?

—Tony G. Huffman
[email protected]