How does one recover from this?

[necessitysslave]

I just came across the concept of what someone could do to a computer and wondered whether you could fix it?

Right click on a .exe file and select open with then choose acrobat reader and check the box saying always use this program to open these files

Comments

[jorune]

I'm guessing there is somewhere in the registry a list of associations that you could regedit or has that been shut down by MS?

Is there a third party that you could use to allow you to change associations?

[necessitysslave]

Understand that I am not going to try this on any computer just in case.....

However regedit is actually regedit.exe and therefore won't work?

thirdparty would have to not be a .exe (so you are looking for a .com?)

[jorune]

A fair point. I guess I am working under the assumption that there some programs/tools than can work from the command line or from some alternate boot state.

[necessitysslave]

Understand that I am not going to try this on any computer just in case.....

Explorer is a .exe so you might(probably?) not be able to open it.

Also in folder options there is a filetypes tab which does list some file associations. .exe is not one of them

[tribal_thrash]

Haw hee haw hee haw! That's a good one! Like it v. much!

[ehrine]

tools->folder options->file types

Then just find it in the list and change it.

I think there is also a key you can press when right clicking that forces the "open with..." option to appear, but I can't remember what it is.

[necessitysslave]

tools menu in explorer.exe?

also as noted above I can't see the .exe filetype presently listed.

[queex]

Although I suppose you might get the same problem if something or someone tinkered with the registry manually?

[queex]

That's a relief.