Sometimes I have to wonder about the quality of advice that people give out 
there.

I picked the recycle bin (under Windows) and hit "delete" instead of "empty 
trash", and the recycle bin disappeared. OK, bad UI, should probably be 
special-cased to always ask, but it's consistent with any other icon on the 
desktop, including things that don't represent real files (like "My computer").

I search the web for how to get it back. Lots of people seem to have done 
this. The first hit returns advice with two people answering. The first 
recommends delving six layers deep into the registry, creating a key with a 
40-character GUID for a value, and then rebooting.

The second says "Open the desktop properties. The first link says 'pick 
which icons show up on the desktop'. Click that link, and set the checkbox 
next to 'recycle bin'."

I honestly can't imagine why anyone would even think of recommending the 
first answer. And this is not uncommon.

"I can play DivX on my desktop machine, but not share it with my XBox."

A: "Install Windows Encoding Package, then install Windows Encoding Package 
SDK, then install VNC, then create files with baroque names with GUIDs for 
values in both the VNC directory and the Windows Encoder directory, then 
give this three-line-long command line to use VNC to transcode the file."

What's wrong with "Install Windows Encoding Package, then *start it up* to 
transcode your file"?  Why recommend going thru all the mess to install and 
configure VNC, creating batch files that invoke plug-ins that ultimately 
runs the same program you had to install to make it work anyway?

Is this part of the same disease that makes people confuse APIs with file 
formats?

</rant> :-)

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   The NFL should go international. I'd pay to
   see the Detroit Lions vs the Roman Catholics.

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> I honestly can't imagine why anyone would even think of recommending the 
> first answer. And this is not uncommon.

  Someone encounters the problem and then tries to solve it himself.
Maybe he isn't very experienced with using Windows (or whatever OS/program),
or maybe he is one of those people who always seem to choose the hardest
way of doing things (even if it's not their intention), but after much
struggling and tons and tons of goose chasing they find an overly complicated
solution to the problem and think that they have figured it all out.

  Then some time later they see someone asking about the very same problem,
and they feel all l33t h4x0r when they can tell them their experience about
solving the problem.

  I once had to configure my Suse box to act as a router (becaue it was
the only way I could get a laptop connected to the internet), and I searched
for instructions on how to do that, specifically with Suse. If you search
for it, you will probably still find the same instructions I found.

  These instructions are really overly complicated. Among other things,
during the whole process, it instructs rebooting the computer no less than
*three* times.

  When I filtered out what I knew I needed from all the useless garbage,
the configuration was rather simple (basically a few clicks here and there
in Yast), and I got it working without having to reboot even once.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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