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ExtractIconExA function (shellapi.h)

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The ExtractIconEx function creates an array of handles to large or small icons extracted from the specified executable file, DLL, or icon file.

Syntax

UINT ExtractIconExA(
  [in]  LPCSTR lpszFile,
  [in]  int    nIconIndex,
  [out] HICON  *phiconLarge,
  [out] HICON  *phiconSmall,
        UINT   nIcons
);

Parameters

[in] lpszFile

Type: LPCTSTR

Pointer to a null-terminated string that specifies the name of an executable file, DLL, or icon file from which icons will be extracted.

[in] nIconIndex

Type: int

Specifies the zero-based index of the first icon to extract. For example, if this value is zero, the function extracts the first icon in the specified file.

If this value is –1 and phiconLarge and phiconSmall are both NULL, the function returns the total number of icons in the specified file. If the file is an executable file or DLL, the return value is the number of RT_GROUP_ICON resources. If the file is an .ico file, the return value is 1.

If this value is a negative number and either phiconLarge or phiconSmall is not NULL, the function begins by extracting the icon whose resource identifier is equal to the absolute value of nIconIndex. For example, use -3 to extract the icon whose resource identifier is 3.

[out] phiconLarge

Type: HICON*

Pointer to an array of icon handles that receives handles to the large icons extracted from the file. If this parameter is NULL, no large icons are extracted from the file.

[out] phiconSmall

Type: HICON*

Pointer to an array of icon handles that receives handles to the small icons extracted from the file. If this parameter is NULL, no small icons are extracted from the file.

nIcons

Type: UINT

The number of icons to extract from the file.

Return value

Type: UINT

If the nIconIndex parameter is -1 and both the phiconLarge and phiconSmall parameters are NULL, then the return value is the number of icons contained in the specified file.

If the nIconIndex parameter is any value other than -1 and either phiconLarge or phiconSmall is not NULL, the return value is the number of icons successfully extracted from the file.

Note

If the function encounters an error, it returns UINT_MAX. In this case, you can call GetLastError to retrieve the error code. For example, this function returns UINT_MAX if the file specified by lpszFile cannot be found while the nIconIndex parameter is any value other than -1 and either phiconLarge or phiconSmall is not NULL. In this case, GetLastError returns ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND (2).

Remarks

When they are no longer needed, you must destroy all icons extracted by ExtractIconEx by calling the DestroyIcon function.

To retrieve the dimensions of the large and small icons, use this function with the SM_CXICON, SM_CYICON, SM_CXSMICON, and SM_CYSMICON flags.

Note

The shellapi.h header defines ExtractIconEx as an alias which automatically selects the ANSI or Unicode version of this function based on the definition of the UNICODE preprocessor constant. Mixing usage of the encoding-neutral alias with code that not encoding-neutral can lead to mismatches that result in compilation or runtime errors. For more information, see Conventions for Function Prototypes.

Requirements

Requirement Value
Minimum supported client Windows XP [desktop apps only]
Minimum supported server Windows 2000 Server [desktop apps only]
Target Platform Windows
Header shellapi.h
DLL Shell32.dll
API set ext-ms-win-shell-shell32-l1-2-1 (introduced in Windows 10, version 10.0.10240)

See also

ExtractAssociatedIcon

ExtractAssociatedIconEx

ExtractIcon