Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Registry Edit

Windows search will automatically search for text in specific files which is very awesome. To see what I'm talking about open a folder, create a .txt file, open and edit the .txt to say "Shoobie". Then save and close. Then in the folder search box, type "Shoobie." Your file should show up.

Anyway, I needed to search .log files which are really .txt files with a different extension (same encoding and editable in Notepad (or Notepad++)) Some quick searching turned this up:

To use the text filter provider for .zzz files, the following registry setting should exist:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.zzz\PersistentHandler\(Default) = {5e941d80-bf96-11cd-b579-08002b30bfeb}
After you add this value to the registry, you must log off and then log back on to make the change take effect.

If you've never edited the registry, here's how to do it:
http://antivirus.about.com/cs/tutorials/ht/regmod.htm

And keep this in mind: When your computer does something, it does it for a reason. If you want to change what it does, search around. You can mess with just about everything. Worst case scenario, everything blows up and you get to start over after formatting your hard drive.