This browser is no longer supported.
Upgrade to Microsoft Edge to take advantage of the latest features, security updates, and technical support.
![](data:image/svg+xml, %3Csvg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' height='64' class='font-weight-bold' style='font: 600 30.11764705882353px "SegoeUI", Arial' width='64'%3E%3Ccircle fill='hsl(198.4, 37%, 29%)' cx='32' cy='32' r='32' /%3E%3Ctext x='50%25' y='55%25' dominant-baseline='middle' text-anchor='middle' fill='%23FFF' %3EPM%3C/text%3E%3C/svg%3E)
We have a Shell window registered under Control Panel. We use Win API CoCreateInstance to create an instance of it on the local system. Earlier this used to use the default explorer.exe process (the one used for tray icons and taskbar). But after installing the recent updates KB4579311 and KB4577671 on Windows 10, we see that a new explorer.exe process is started with /factory switch. It looks something like this in the task manager.
C:\windows\explorer.exe /factory,{5BD95610-9434-43C2-886C-57852CC8A120} -Embedding
We also observed that now launching Control Panel always runs it in a separate explorer.exe with a similar "/factory" switch.
There are also couple of new registry keys which look related - these do not exist on machine without updates.
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{5BD95610-9434-43C2-886C-57852CC8A120}
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{5BD95610-9434-43C2-886C-57852CC8A120}\LocalServer32
My question is - Has something changed in these recent updates that causes this behavior? Is there a way via some preference or registry settings to force the default explorer.exe to be used?
Is this a conscious design change to always use a separate explorer.exe for opening Control Panel and all the programs registered under it? If so, is there some documentation update or articles that provides more insights into this?
![](data:image/svg+xml, %3Csvg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' height='64' class='font-weight-bold' style='font: 600 30.11764705882353px "SegoeUI", Arial' width='64'%3E%3Ccircle fill='hsl(92.8, 12%, 18%)' cx='32' cy='32' r='32' /%3E%3Ctext x='50%25' y='55%25' dominant-baseline='middle' text-anchor='middle' fill='%23FFF' %3EDL%3C/text%3E%3C/svg%3E)
Does this change cause you any problems, if so, what are they; or is this just a question because you've observed it?
Yes, it causes a problem for us. We have an application which contributes some menu options to files and folders. The application also has a shell window which has been registered under the Control Panel. After this change, since the shell window opens in a different process, any file explorer windows opened thereafter have no context of preferences or selections done from the Control Panel. Earlier both were part of the same process and hence shared the memory space, Our application never supported the multiple processes case either with the "open each window in new process" preference or when user opened explorer.exe with options that caused new processes to be created.
![](data:image/svg+xml, %3Csvg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' height='64' class='font-weight-bold' style='font: 600 30.11764705882353px "SegoeUI", Arial' width='64'%3E%3Ccircle fill='hsl(128, 8%, 22%)' cx='32' cy='32' r='32' /%3E%3Ctext x='50%25' y='55%25' dominant-baseline='middle' text-anchor='middle' fill='%23FFF' %3EA%3C/text%3E%3C/svg%3E)
Hi @Prabodh Mairh ,
Would this just a separated Explorer.exe, so if one crashes the other stays alive?
----------
If the Answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and upvote it.
Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.
Best Regards
Karlie
@Anonymous Our application was written to run in proc the main explorer.exe (the one associated with taskbar and desktop). In the event of the explorer.exe getting crashed, everything started on a clean plate anyway, but it worked. But now the things are broken since part of it runs on a separate explorer.exe and we never supported that scenario - no inter process communication is built in.
