"Recent" list in Win10 context menu does not show file without extension

Petra Handwerg

Hi,
in Win10 every tool/program in the task bar shows a list of “recent” and “pinned” elements after right-clicking the icon.
I love this feature, but although I used the “hosts” file during the last days again and again it does not show up in this list.
Inside notepad++ it is listed and accessible under the “File” menu, but not in Windows’ context menu on the np++ icon.

Is it possible that this does not work with “files without extension” at all?

PeterJones

@Petra-Handwerg ,

It appears you are correct: at first, I thought it was because of the uniqueness of hosts, which is in the system32 folder hierarchy, so I thought maybe Windows was hiding it and other system files. So I created a file called noextension in one of my normal folders, and it didn’t show up in the pinned-taskbar-icon right-click menu (aka “JumpList”), whether immediately or after exiting and restarting Notepad++ with the file open, or using Windows Explorer to Edit In Notepad++ on noextension. If I created yesextension.txt inside Notepad++, it immediately showed up in the JumpList.

The JumpList is a feature of Windows, not Notepad++. As far as I know, it would be Windows, not Notepad++, that is deciding which files show up in the JumpList by default

That said, there is a Notepad++ plugin called NppJumpList (you can install it using the Plugins Admin), which allows you to add/pin items to the Windows JumpList for Notepad++ – so it should presumably allow you to pin hosts to the JumpList… But it uses some strange tricks behind the scenes to do this, and it means when you run Notepad++, the open instance will create a new taskbar icon rather than having the live icon in the same location on the taskbar as your pinned icon.

Petra Handwerg

Thank you @PeterJones for your quick reply and for confirming that it’s a Windows “feature”!
I thought that I missed to change something in my Notepad++ configuration, that’s why I asked.

As this is my “work” laptop (and the JumpList is working fine for np++ for “normal” files) I don’t want to install too many tools - only those I can justify that I need them for my work. ;)
E.g. the plugins for xml and json - they are great!

Thanks again!