Missing File and Folder Names in Windows Vista Explorer Large Icon and Details View Easter Egg (or Bug?)
There is hardly any easter egg can be found in modern operating system nowadays. In Windows Vista, some of the found ‘easter eggs’ (if you claim it’s an easter egg, as it may be a function or bug anyway) are time and date function in Notepad and hidden switch for screen savers. Another easter egg (or probably is actually a bug) is to hide or make the name or title of the files and folders appear missing or disappeared when viewing listing in Windows Explorer, as shown in illustration below.
To make the files’ and folders’ names disappear or hidden, run Windows Explorer (or any shell folder). Press and hold down Ctrl and Shift keys, and click on the Views button multiple times to quickly switch between the views available to display and list the contents of the folder. After several change of views, the “Large Icons” view will display without any name for folders and files, as in figure above.
The symptom also happens in “Details” view.
It’s unclear whether it’s a bug or easter egg in Windows Vista, which affects also system already installed with Windows Vista SP1. After you manage to get the missing or hidden name effect, simply continue to browse to other folder to revert back or break the missing file and folder name effect.
And, if your Windows Vista is facing the issue without using trick above (mean the folder and file name displayed in folder listing is always disappearing), the recovery step is to perform a disk scanning on drive that is affected by Check Disk. The ‘problem’ should be resolved and fixed after a system restart after system finished disk checking.
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June 5th, 2008 16:23
Anybody working in software industry knows that there’s no room for easter eggs in any piece of code. Any un-necessary feature poses a security risk or creates potential bugs elsewhere in the product… easter eggs are a relic from the past.
it’s at 100% certainty a bug
June 6th, 2008 08:38
XP also have something similar when you use the miniature view, after performing the same steps for vista.
June 24th, 2008 19:46
Actually do not have to hold CTRL and Shift keys, just need to hold Shift key. And this bug is still in Vista SP1.
October 3rd, 2008 21:28
Actually, i face the problem now and i tried the solution above but it didn’t work. I still have lost the names on two drives. Any other trick?
October 17th, 2008 15:35
While I personally think it’s a terrible idea, this is NOT a bug! It’s a known part of the OS. The idea is that you are supposed to be able to display just the thumbnails of images in “Pictures and Videos” folder types.
In fact, if you change a folder’s “type” (Right click on a folder icon->Customize->Pictures and Videos pulldown), and you then right click and bring up the view from within that folder, you’ll see an OPTION called “Hide File Names” that allows you to do this very thing.
Also, as mentioned in reply #3, you don’t have to involve the CTRL key at all, only the shift key. Unfortunately, the proposed fix doesn’t work either. You’re SUPPOSED to just have to double-click to open the folder while holding down the shift key, but that is completely hit or miss.
November 9th, 2008 10:56
Geo’s post is the most informative so far on this issue. The disappearing filenames in any of the icon views have been a constant source of frustration for me. I am sure this is happening so often to me, because Shift-Alt key switches keyboard maps and I am in multilingual environment. In particular, filenames can have Latin, Cyrillic, and other characters.
That a bug IS INVOLVED, I am virtually certain, however, since disappance of filename labels happens to me in “All Items” folders — not “Pictures and Videos” folders, where the option “Hide File Names” is present, and even may make sense.
I would say the level of annoyance present in this issue is comparable with another nightmare in Windows Vista: its inability to remember the view of a folder. I can’t believe that something like that could be released by Microsoft programmers to the public. Why such well attested annoyances haven’t been fixed yet?
November 18th, 2008 00:16
Yet another brilliant Vista “feature” that only manages to give me more headaches.