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janaFlag for United States of America

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How to get Excel and Word recent in thier right-click Taskbar icons

Hi Experts!

Don't know what happened, but lost my recent pinned documents in the Word and Excel in the Task bar.  I did also pinned the document within each apps, but they don't show the "recent" pinned (see pix below).  How can I get the documents backed seen as pinned when right-click the Excel/Word icon in the Taskbar?
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Jazz Marie Kaur
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Your screenshots\pictures are not present currently. 
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True... here it is (this is when I right-click Excel):
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What I am trying to accomplish is similar to when u right-click on Internet Explorer, u see recent or pinned (see pix below)

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maybe you deleted "recent" history with a tool like Glary/CCleaner...
whats happening now, when you open a file and close
does it show on the list, or recent is totally disabled for "office apps"?
is this happening only to office apps?
Did you just pin these icons or they have been like that since the OneNote issue you had earlier? I would try testing pinning another version of an Office application you have and see if it’s just happening on 2010. Is it only happening to 2010 pinned Office apps.
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maybe you deleted "recent" history with a tool like Glary/CCleaner... 

did not deleted "recent" history  or used a tool.


Did you just pin these icons or they have been like that since the OneNote issue you had earlier? I would try testing pinning another version of an Office application 

Just noticed it but can't identified cause - and OneNote 2016 does has their "recent" notebook open
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FYI,
I even drag a document, place it on top of the item, but no list is displayed (I do this with Paint and worked, with Ord/Excel, no)
when you open Windows Explorer, Win+E
can you see any word/excel files in "Recent Files" section?

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Press Win+R and type

shell:recent 

press enter...
do you see your files here?

it should point to

C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent
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HainKurt. yes I see "Recent Files" section  (and yes on you second entry)... but that is not the problem.  The problem is the Excel and Word does not display recent when i right-click its icon on the taskbar

you can check this, maybe it is turned-off for whatever reason...
(last item on screenshot, make sure it is turned on)

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it's on (the problem is only word/excel, all other apps displays their recent.
when you open this folder

C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent

do you see anything strange on excel/word file list?
check sizes of those...
do you see any 0bytes or very short/long compared to the rest?
maybe it is corrupted, you can delete that one...
it may fix...

also, from above settings, you can turn off / apply and then turn on again
it will delete all recent file list and start collecting again...
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Thanx Hainkurt... there are files, 1kb, i deleted them all and turn on/off, still same problem 
  • Can you try removing and re-pinning Word and Excel again?
  • It sounds like user profile issues or corruption\damage somewhere — can you test switching over to another user account and see if recent items works in another profile? Or create some files under that test user profile and see if recent items works there?

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Tried it, never pins.

Also tied changing users even the admin, same problem.
Do you see the recent files from when you right-click on Excel 2010 or Word  in the Windows 10 start menu or they don’t display there as well? I know you want the task bar to display recent files but curious if its broken in both places.
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That's the problem, no recent files from when you right-click on Excel 2010 or Word  recent files from when you right-click on Excel 2010 or Word (the pix below I right-click, nothing)

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Got it. I’ll have to think about this one for a little bit. It’s quite odd. When you deleted those recent items did you restart once afterwards? Only thing I can think of at this time is repairing 2010 again then restarting.


in excel, when you click open, do you see any recent files

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Jazz, yes, I did restart, same thing.

HainKurt, yes, when I open Excel/Word, there is my recents (that is the only way for now for me)
Very weird. Others have certainly run into similar behavior in the Microsoft community. I think you already tried the recent items deletion, but interesting what they tried here with Excel and the registry in this case:


Since it’s across two profiles in Windows - it sounds like corruption or damage somewhere in the OS that needs to be fixed which usually I would suggest running the below — but you stated once you have pretty bad experiences with these commands on your workstation so perhaps not advisable unless you have a back up and restore point etc.

sfc /scannow  
         
 DISM.exe /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth

What version of Windows 10 are you currently on? 
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Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19042.804]
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But sfc & DISM is not guaranteed to fix this problem.
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Jazz Marie Kaur
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I was thinking Windows has some damaged files since it’s across 2 accounts
I uninstalled Mso2019 and Mso2010.  Since I needed Mso2010, I reinstalled only Mso2010; so there is no other installed of Mso

Did you try removing the pinned shortcuts of Excel and Word  
There was never any pinned docs after the reinstall Mso2010; maybe it had to do with this reinstall, but can't be sure.

I even tried a new new virtual desktop but same problem: cannot pin any document of Microsoft Office
Yes — uninstall and reinstall would have removed those.  It is very unusual that the issue persists still but others appear to have run into issues with their jump list and recently closed items too.

You also said initially “did also pinned the document within each apps“ but did you try dragging a document down onto the taskbar also to create a fresh pinned shortcut of e.g. Excel.

Perhaps look through this Microsoft community and Technet community case report from other users — I think you have tried quite a few of these for troubleshooting this already. It’s very odd that other Office applications are okay, except Word and Excel.

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Yes, super strange, but will keep trying.
This might work: Right-click the taskbar and select Taskbar settings. On the left side of the screen select Start. The last option, “Show recently opened items in Jump Lists on Start or the taskbar and in File Explorer Quick Access” should be set to On. I turned mine off and the list did not show!

Paul
I should note, if yours was off and you just turned it back on, you will have to open a couple of excel files before the list populates.
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Thank u, other experts suggested; It's been on all the time.
I wonder if you turn it off then wait a bit then restart and then turn that back on whether it would register that change - just a thought. Did you try a completely new profile name that hasn’t signed in before also?
It definitely is something broken in Windows since it doesn’t work in two profiles, Is Windows completely updated? Perhaps make a System Restore point before trying this and any repair commands. Otherwise only thing I can think of is the sfc and DISM command line. An in-place repair install of Windows 10 is a bit much to try to fix this. That is all I can think of.
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Yes on all counts.

But yesterday we were brain-storming here and it might be that we installed Mso2010 while Mso2019 was installed, started using Ms2010 (for the purpose of the time), then uninstalled Mso2019 (since this license expired).  Could this be it? IF so, how can we fix it?
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Just noticed also with Notepad++, no recent when roght-click on taskbar

Yet, I use Paint.net and has their recent @right-click.  Windows notepad also has it, and paintbrush.

Strange.


Maybe it was something with the install and uninstall order of 2010 and 2019. I know Microsoft has a scrubbing uninstaller tool - option #2 below for Office too — maybe it didn’t cleanly uninstall? Or there are remnants conflicting causing some glitches.
 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/uninstall-office-from-a-pc-9dd49b83-264a-477a-8fcc-2fdf5dbf61d8

I believe I saw a Microsoft community post someone did say sadly sfc failed for them and they ended up making and testing a completely fresh new user account in Windows then migrating their user data over. Its a very strange issue.

Mostly this issue happens due to corruption or damage to the below locations or system registry at times it appears.

%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\AutomaticDestinations

Open in new window


%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\CustomDestinations

Open in new window

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Will check it out
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did check those 2 paths and they have over 50 "recent", what does that mean?
Sorry, I missed what HainKurt suggested earlier examining the recent location and rebuilding I believe. So you have a list growing there under recent sections again so it’s not working as we see — even if you clear all items from the recent paths I don’t think it will work again. I think the issue is originating from the Windows registry. I don’t know what keys are specifically tied to the jump list off the top of my head. I would be careful making modifications or changes to the registry and back it up. So if we can find the registry keys for this or leverage that to completely remove Jump List‘s then enable it again through the registry that may be a way. Recreating the key for the jump lists in the OS.
Just checking in. Were you able to resolve this?  Or its still happening?
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Hi I've been out for some time.  I will review the question and answer accordingly
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No Jazz, I haven't been able to solve this.
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Any advice?
  • Does it work in another user profile fine? It may be the profile hit some damage or something got muddled there
  • Also, can't recall from the above, did we try something like this where you toggle the setting off, open a document freshly created or save and then go back and re-toggle it, see example Microsoft Jump List W10 - UMichael Allen - Video. Also, instead of Word etc. try Excel or even PowerPoint.
  • I suspect something in the system registry changed to cause this, if you had pending updates perhaps those could be tried but be cautious as I've seen them cause odd behavior with older versions of Office.
  • Otherwise, I would lodge a case with Microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/contactus, but they may just state they don't recommend multiple versions
I'm going to reach out to a few more fellow Experts also.
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Thanx Jazz.  yes we tried your suggestions earlier.
I reached out to a few fellow Experts. I forgot, what was the reason you needed 2010? We believe 2010 perhaps is more prone to these types of issues not resolving easily causing the problem and conflict as its no longer supported. I know some fellow Experts have multiple versions of Office, but not a lot. Since a new profile results in the same issue, you may need to consider repairing W10 possibly if you still want to use 2010. It was advised that at some point 2010 will completely fail to function properly as it ages it becomes buggy at times. I am still waiting to hear back from a few more Experts though and some may add comments further to your post.
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Sorry guys been sick for bit but back, will read answer/close.
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Hi Jazz, the problem is not the version, I have Notepad++ and also doesn't display recent.

And the crazy thing it's working and don't know why it's working Excel/Word recent files in Taskbar.  I didn't do anything since I have not been doing any work on the computer, but when I did open, it started downloading Windows updates.

Could that have fixed it?

Weird. Awesome though! Yes, looking back at a past comment I mentioned possibly more W10 updates or updating further could correct it or break things further, so I stated as a precaution perhaps don't maybe as its risky overall but looks like it helped in your case fix it.

https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/29207753/How-to-get-Excel-and-Word-recent-in-thier-right-click-Taskbar-icons.html#a43242199 

I would still recommend moving away from Office 2010 in the near future its no longer supported by Microsoft and you're bound to run into hiccups now and then due to its age.
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Ok thanx will close!