New Notepad Win11 An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\mylogin\Documents'. The parameter is incorrect.

Question

New Notepad Win11 An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\mylogin\Documents'. The parameter is incorrect.

Kevin Jameson 21

In the past few days my Win11/x64 machine auto-rebooted after a midnight Windows Update operation.

After the upgrade, when I started Notepad, it showed me a ribbon notification "A new version of Notepad is available. LAUNCH (a button)."

I stupidly clicked the button, and it appeared to switch to a new version of notepad. At least, the offer to launch the new version disappeared.
I eventually ended up in a nightmare of installing the Microsoft Store notepad (which seemed to be "new version" that was being offered).
It installed but I think it trashed my old c:\windows\system32\notepad.exe installation.

Now my programs that start c:\windows\system32\notepad.exe give me this error message:

An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\kkkwj\Documents'. The parameter is incorrect.

After spending several wasted hours reading up on the errors and trying to debug it, uninstalling the notepad store app, checking all my disks (they are good), reinstalling some 2013 C++ redistributables, and otherwise wasting my time, I still get the error above. My code has been working for many months until this notepad headache started.

A prior error message said that it could not start because the side-by-side installation was incorrect. But I haven't seen that since I uninstalled the Notepad app.

What's going on? How can I (1) start notepad programmatically like I did for months before the "new notepad version" headache? Thank you.

Kevin Jameson 21 Reputation points

2022-08-17T05:34:25.303+00:00

In visual studio, this is the full error. I no longer have a side-by-side installation of notepad, to the best of my knowledge. I could not find anything in the "application event log" (was I looking in the right place?). And I don't know how to use the sxstrace.exe tool. The problem showed up when I stupidly clicked the LAUNCH button offer of the new notepad. Something in that process screwed up the "side-by-side" installation, whatever that is.

I also made SURE that I had reinstalled the latest C++ redistributables (x86 and x64) and rebooted (again). But nothing helps. It still complains with the side-by-side error. I also ran the sxstrace tool, captured a binary log file, and converted it to a txt file. The txt file was 1KB and empty.

System.ComponentModel.Win32Exception
HResult=0x80004005
Message=An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\kkkwj\Documents'. The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail.
Source=System.Diagnostics.Process
StackTrace:
at System.Diagnostics.Process.StartWithCreateProcess(ProcessStartInfo startInfo)
at System.Diagnostics.Process.Start()
at System.Diagnostics.Process.Start(ProcessStartInfo startInfo)
at HsWindows.WindowForeground.ProcesStartWithArguments(String exepath, String arguments) in C:\dev\Highspeed\HsWindows\HsWindows\WindowForeground.cs:line 356
Kevin Jameson 21 Reputation points

2022-08-18T02:22:36.833+00:00

I am not sure that this is a definitive answer, but it was the last step that seemed to work for a while. (Since writing this, the problem has appeared again.)

I went through the redistributable list (2010, 2013, 2019, etc.) to collect all the known version numbers that were available from Microsoft. Then I compared those versions with the ones that I installed. In my travels at the MS site, there was an issue with one of their releases where installing the x86 version would delete the x64 version. This may have been an issue on my machine when I was installing versions.

They fixed it in KB3138367 and provided a new installer that would ensure both x86 and x64 versions were installed. I installed that one, reinstalled the latest notepad app from the MS store, and the issue went away for a few hours. The link to that KB version is below.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/update-for-visual-c-2013-and-visual-c-redistributable-package-18d278e8-1c79-2630-e8ae-e9f4679b2393

Kevin Jameson 21 Reputation points

2022-08-17T05:34:25.303+00:00

In visual studio, this is the full error. I no longer have a side-by-side installation of notepad, to the best of my knowledge. I could not find anything in the "application event log" (was I looking in the right place?). And I don't know how to use the sxstrace.exe tool. The problem showed up when I stupidly clicked the LAUNCH button offer of the new notepad. Something in that process screwed up the "side-by-side" installation, whatever that is.

I also made SURE that I had reinstalled the latest C++ redistributables (x86 and x64) and rebooted (again). But nothing helps. It still complains with the side-by-side error. I also ran the sxstrace tool, captured a binary log file, and converted it to a txt file. The txt file was 1KB and empty.

System.ComponentModel.Win32Exception
HResult=0x80004005
Message=An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\kkkwj\Documents'. The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail.
Source=System.Diagnostics.Process
StackTrace:
at System.Diagnostics.Process.StartWithCreateProcess(ProcessStartInfo startInfo)
at System.Diagnostics.Process.Start()
at System.Diagnostics.Process.Start(ProcessStartInfo startInfo)
at HsWindows.WindowForeground.ProcesStartWithArguments(String exepath, String arguments) in C:\dev\Highspeed\HsWindows\HsWindows\WindowForeground.cs:line 356
Kevin Jameson 21 Reputation points

2022-08-18T02:22:36.833+00:00

I am not sure that this is a definitive answer, but it was the last step that seemed to work for a while. (Since writing this, the problem has appeared again.)

I went through the redistributable list (2010, 2013, 2019, etc.) to collect all the known version numbers that were available from Microsoft. Then I compared those versions with the ones that I installed. In my travels at the MS site, there was an issue with one of their releases where installing the x86 version would delete the x64 version. This may have been an issue on my machine when I was installing versions.

They fixed it in KB3138367 and provided a new installer that would ensure both x86 and x64 versions were installed. I installed that one, reinstalled the latest notepad app from the MS store, and the issue went away for a few hours. The link to that KB version is below.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/update-for-visual-c-2013-and-visual-c-redistributable-package-18d278e8-1c79-2630-e8ae-e9f4679b2393

Answer 1

Ramesh Srinivasan 171

Hi Kevin,

Would you like to revert to the classic Notepad? If so, uninstalling the Notepad Store app should bring back the classic version.

Answer 2

Kevin Jameson 21

Thank you for your suggestion, Ramesh.

It turns out that the error message was WAY off the track on the real problem.

The real problem was that MS changed the default value for UseShellExecute from true (in NET Framework) to false (in NET 6).

I changed my NET 6 code accordingly (set it to true), and (touch wood) the problem has not surfaced for a few hours.

What a WILD GOOSE CHASE!

I left the new app installed, too.

Ramesh Srinivasan 171 Reputation points

2022-08-20T17:17:37.84+00:00

Glad you got this resolved, Kevin. Thanks for letting us know.

Answer 3

Ramesh Srinivasan 171

Hi Kevin,

Glad you figured this out. Thank you for sharing this info.

New Notepad Win11 An error occurred trying to start process '"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe"' with working directory 'C:\Users\mylogin\Documents'. The parameter is incorrect.

3 answers

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