From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

David E. Ross wrote:
Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 x64

I created an additional toolbar called Applications. For a long time,
the entries were sorted exactly the way I wanted. Earlier this week, however, it disappeared. When I made it visitble again, the entries
were sorted differently, with folders at the top and other entries
arranged alphabetically.

I re-sorted it, and it remained okay during a session. When I rebooted, however, it returned to the sort with folders at the top and other
entries alphabetically.

How can I save my preferred sort from one session to the next?

--

David E. Ross
<http>

Some Republican officials have denounced the assassination
of Charlie Kirk as a conspiracy by liberal Democrats. Why
then is the attempted kidnapping of the Democrat governor
of Michigan, the shooting of a Democrat state senator of
Minnesota, and the assassination of the Democrat speaker
of the Minnesota state assembly not denounced as a
conservative Republican conspiracy?

I'm pretty sure what you're running into is just how the Windows 7 taskbar toolbars work. They aren't like a freeform list you can permanently drag into any order. They're basically a view of a folder, and Windows keeps snapping them back to its idea of a "sensible" sort, which is folders first and then alphabetical. You can sometimes drag things around and it looks right for the current session, but after a reboot it reverts because that manual ordering isn't really something it's designed to store.

If you want the order to survive restarts, the reliable workaround is to make the names sort the way you want. Put shortcuts to everything in the folder that the Applications toolbar points at, then rename those shortcuts with a prefix so they sort in your preferred order, like 01 Chrome, 02 Mail, 03 Editor, and so on. If you don't want to see the numbers, you can use short prefixes or symbols, but numbers are the least annoying and the most predictable.

If what you really want is a custom order that isn't tied to naming at all, then the honest answer is that the built in toolbar feature just doesn't do that consistently, and you'll have a better time with a launcher menu type tool instead of fighting the taskbar.


This is a response to the post seen at: http://www.jlaforums.com/viewtopic.php?p=698609402#698609402
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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On Fri, 2/27/2026 12:35 PM, MummyChunk wrote:

David E. Ross wrote:
Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 x64

I created an additional toolbar called Applications.-a For a long time,
the entries were sorted exactly the way I wanted.-a Earlier this week,
however, it disappeared.-a When I made it visitble again, the entries
were sorted differently, with folders at the top and other entries
arranged alphabetically.

I re-sorted it, and it remained okay during a session.-a When I rebooted,
however, it returned to the sort with folders at the top and other
entries alphabetically.

How can I save my preferred sort from one session to the next?

David E. Ross

I'm pretty sure what you're running into is just how the Windows 7 taskbar toolbars work. They aren't like a freeform list you can permanently drag into any order. They're basically a view of a folder, and Windows keeps snapping them back to its idea of a "sensible" sort, which is folders first and then alphabetical. You can sometimes drag things around and it looks right for the current session, but after a reboot it reverts because that manual ordering isn't really something it's designed to store.

If you want the order to survive restarts, the reliable workaround is to make the names sort the way you want. Put shortcuts to everything in the folder that the Applications toolbar points at, then rename those shortcuts with a prefix so they sort in your preferred order, like 01 Chrome, 02 Mail, 03 Editor, and so on. If you don't want to see the numbers, you can use short prefixes or symbols, but numbers are the least annoying and the most predictable.

If what you really want is a custom order that isn't tied to naming at all, then the honest answer is that the built in toolbar feature just doesn't do that consistently, and you'll have a better time with a launcher menu type tool instead of fighting the taskbar.

The OPs symptoms come from using the File Explorer Options dialog
for the particular file system, clicking "Apply" then "Apply to all Folders".

It is the "Apply to all Folders" from some attempt to apply
"default" sort strategy, that has over-ridden whatever was
previously stored as the option.

The "Apply to all Folders" is perilous, and especially as
it is also selective about the thing, and there can still be
things like File Open dialogs that do not listen to where
that setting is set.

You would have to find a way to go back to whatever folder stores
that and set the sort order to None. And does that option
even exist ? You can set Group to None. And Group might not even
be in Windows 7, it might have been in a later Windows.

It would be highly beneficial if there was a maintenance
utility that would, independently of File Explorer, allow
correcting such settings.

Paul
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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On 11/15/2025 9:30 AM, David E. Ross wrote:

Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 x64

I created an additional toolbar called Applications. For a long time,
the entries were sorted exactly the way I wanted. Earlier this week, however, it disappeared. When I made it visitble again, the entries
were sorted differently, with folders at the top and other entries
arranged alphabetically.

I re-sorted it, and it remained okay during a session. When I rebooted, however, it returned to the sort with folders at the top and other
entries alphabetically.

How can I save my preferred sort from one session to the next?

Three months ago, I was able to get Applications the way I wanted it.
At my age (84), however, I do not remember what I did.

Start is also in a folder. It too can be rearranged, not in the folder
but in the desktop display. Thus, my problem was not merely because Applications is a folder.
--
David E. Ross
<http://www.rossde.com/>
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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On 27/02/2026 22:34, David E. Ross wrote:

At my age (84), however, I do not remember what I did.

So, you can teach an old dog new tricks. Why do people get this so wrong?



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