How do I stop XP from thinking this old program is newly installed?

August 31, 2004 1:05 PM

Stupid annoying WinXP question. I installed an older program I use for data analysis in my lab. Every time I click the start menu it shows up as a newly installed program, despite the fact that I've used it quite a bit. I want it to go away and show up as an old program, not highlighted like a new one. The only help I can find using my formidable Google-Fu is "Turn off new program notification". Well, I don't want to do that; I like to know if something new has been added to my machine. Anyone know how XP marks programs as newly installed, or highlighted, and how to turn this off on an individual entry basis rather than across the board?
posted by caution live frogs to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

I thought the highlight was for recently used programs. You can re-alphabetize the menu by rightclicking on it and choosing Sort by Name. You can get rid of context sensitive menus by unchecking Personalized Menus, as describe here.
posted by theora55 at 2:58 PM on August 31, 2004

What if you drag the folder or item out of the start menu completely? That might fix it, then you can put the icon back as you wish.
posted by smackfu at 3:38 PM on August 31, 2004

Response by poster: heh, i thought that might work. moving the icons that is. i just can't understand why it isn't more obvious where the "this is new" setting was stored - some registry thing or something, but i can't find it.

thanks though.
posted by caution live frogs at 5:57 PM on August 31, 2004