setup in vb net makes shortcuts that do not show native icon in start menu

[jctwin9]

I've been trying to clean up the installer I created using vb 2005 as best as possible to finalize a project I am working on. I have my installer deploying a .pdf file in the application folder. I want the installer to create a shortcut to that .pdf file in the start menu. I do this by right clicking on the .pdf file that I have included on the setup project in the application folder of the files system editor and making a shortcut. After that I move the shortcut to the user's program menu. Here is the slight issue: the setup does create the link properly and I can click on it and the .pdf will come up, but for some reason the .pdf icon does not show up properly. The icon looks like the sheet of paper with blue lines on is that is standard in vb.

Instead of making a shortcut to the file, if I make a second full copy of the .pdf file and put it in the user's program menu folder, the installer will install properly but this time the icon is the expected .pdf icon. I would prefer not to do this because its not really a robust solution.

Surely there is a way to make a proper shortcut and I am just doing it incorrectly, or maybe its just that the windows installer package is incapable of doing this properly. My company will probably not be dishing out for the install-shield or some other package any time soon so I was hoping I might be able to get some input from the vb 2005 pros on this forum.

[TRScheel]

Right click on the shortcut in the visual studio setup and deploy project and select 'properties window' to bring up the properties sub window. There will be an icon property that you can set. That might help (just include the pdf icon). If it is set to something other than none that might also be your problem.

[jctwin9]

Right click on the shortcut in the visual studio setup and deploy project and select 'properties window' to bring up the properties sub window. There will be an icon property that you can set. That might help (just include the pdf icon). If it is set to something other than none that might also be your problem.

Good observation, but the icon property is set to none. If I select the actual pdf icon file that I have on my computer (first I'd have to find it and then add it to the setup and deploy project) then it will probably not use the native pdf icon on the final user's computer (eg. they have an older version of adobe reader).

[TRScheel]

Good observation, but the icon property is set to none. If I select the actual pdf icon file that I have on my computer (first I'd have to find it and then add it to the setup and deploy project) then it will probably not use the native pdf icon on the final user's computer (eg. they have an older version of adobe reader).

Well if it makes you feel better I can reproduce the problem you are having. I create a shortcut through explorer and one through the setup and deploy project and noticed some very interesting differences:

Target Location is blank in the S&D version
Target is the project name in S&D version, file location in explorer version
Open File Location and Change Icon are grayed out in the S&D version

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From what I have read and researched it seems like thats just how it works. You have to include the icon if you want it to work