I can't seem to get the icons to display under Windows 7 and I really miss this from Windows XP.
How can it be fixed?
Windows can only show a limited number of Overlay Icons (15 total, 11 after what Windows uses). Programs like Office Groove, Dropbox, Mozy, Carbonite, etc, will hijack a bunch of the 11 possible overlay icons (boy would it be nice if Microsoft upped the number of these as the number of applications that use them seem to increase and increase)...
You can see what overlays are set up, and change them (at your own risk) in the registry here:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers
If you are using TortoiseCVS (and have nothing else using overlay icons), you will get a couple of TortoiseSVN Icons, and all of your TortoiseCVS icons. This is because the overlay icons are used in alphabetical order. Again, at your own risk (editing the registry may blow up your computer, yada, yada, yada -- and if you are reading Stack Overflow and using Windows and haven't edited the registry, you are a rare beast indeed), feel free to rename them (I suggest putting numbers in front of the ones you want to use and "z_"'s prefixed to the ones you don't need). The TortoiseSVN Shell extensions are nicely named so you know what they do, the TortoiseCVS extensions are not. After looking through the source code, I found the pertinent information:
Before doing anything to your registry or similar procedures listed in Kris Erickson's (excellent) answer or the ones below, there's something to consider...
Are you on a network drive?
If so, go to Tortoise SVN settings (right click any folder > TortoiseSVN > Settings), then go to 'Icon Overlays'
Make sure you've checked 'Network Drives' as pictured:
By default on a fresh Tortoise install, network drives don't have the icons added.
This solved the problem for us. If this fails for you then obviously you can go through the (slightly) more involved solutions listed here.
Also restarting your PC is not needed. Instead restart explorer.exe:
explorer
Windows Explorer has restarted and the TortoiseSVN icons reappear.
I resolved it by using Autoruns from Sysinternals.
I had the same issue as the OP: Win 7 (x64), TortoiseSVN (x64), and DropBox (x86). The info from some of the other answers gave me all the info. I've only ever had the x64 version of TSVN installed on this machine.
In my case TSVN and DropBox were installed the same day I did the OS install and the overlays worked fine until a couple of days ago. I did nothing involving changing settings for either app to cause them to stop working.
Here is what I had in the icon overlay registry section after the problem started (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers
):
I verified that only the overlays corresponding to the first 11 entries display in Explorer. When I modified the order of above entries by adding 'z' to the start of some of them, again only the first 11 overlays (under the updated order) would display.
With the above I had everything I needed to solve the problem (either rename or or delete entries so that the TSVN entries I want working are <= #11 on the list). Below deals with wondering why this suddenly happened.
I know that based on the overlays that worked prior to a couple of days ago, keys 1-3, 7-9, 12-13 were all <= 11 in the list (not sure if overlay #14 ever worked since I never had files w/ read-only status. #15 never worked on this machine so i know it was never in the top 11). I also assume the block of TSVN keys move up/down in unison, therefore they were bumped down either two or three places (* see below). This implies that 2-3 items were added between the DropBox & TSVN blocks. The three that are there now are added by Windows and I would assume they'd be there as soon as the OS installed.
Is the list of 15 overlays determined at run-time? Seems like the overlay handlers might sometimes tell the windows shell that there are no icons to add to the list. Possibly some settings I messed with a couple of days ago related to file sharing and file encryption caused some of those items at the 4-6 spots to become "activated" and push the SVN ones down.
In the end I deleted a couple of entries and moved some, so my final list looks like this:
Two other possible solutions:
Kill TSVNCache.exe and let it re-launch. This has caused my shell overlay icons to re-appear on several occasions.
If you've recently upgraded TortoiseSVN from a previous version, you may need to upgrade your working copy. This can be done by right-clicking on your project folder and choose "SVN Upgrade working copy" from the context menu.
I suggest complaining to Microsoft regarding the ridiculously low icon overlay limit. If enough of us complain, perhaps they'll fix the true root cause of this problem:
See comments at bottom of page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc144123(VS.85).aspx
Give Microsoft Windows 7 team feedback on this issue: http://mymfe.microsoft.com/Windows%207/Feedback.aspx?formID=195
My icons had disappeared too. The registry fixes did not work for me either.
This is how I got them back:
Same problem for me. It turns out that the cause of the problem was the new JungleDisk 3.0, which rudely installs three overlays named "1Sync..." "2Sync..." and "3Sync..." pushing the Tortoise ones off the end.
Just delete those JungleDisk keys in the reg hive listed at the top (or prefix them with z_) and re-start the system and Tortoise should work fine again.
Given that this overlay limit exists in Windows and is easily hit with current tools, tool vendors really should ask during advanced installation if the user wants to install them. I have no need nor desire for the new "Sync" feature and don't really care for the tactic of stuffing the icons at the top of the list with clever naming. Shame on JungleDisk.
Have you tried to change in Tortoise Settings the status cache to 'Default'? I had this problem with the overlay icon on folders because I had this option in 'Shell'. The option is in Settings -> Icons overlay.
Maybe this could help you http://tortoisesvn.net/node/97
In my case, Dropbox overlays were starting with a " (quoted identifier) in the registry. I deleted all the " prefixes and restarted explorer.exe.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers
Edit: I installed Windows 10 and this solution didn't work for me. So I just went to the same registry location and deleted all Google and SkyDrive records and restarted explorer.exe.
Second edit: After installing TortoiseGit it fixed everything without any customisation.
I just upgraded to TSVN 1.6.8.19260 on a WinXP and two Win7 machines. After upgrading, the overlay icons disappeared on all 3 machines. Under the above mentioned registry key, I only found the entry for offline files. I simply had to reinstall/repair the TSVN installation and the icons reappeared after a reboot. I've never detected that behaviour in any previous TSVN version and I certainly installed TSVN everytime the same way with the same permissions.
If you have recently upgraded Tortoise SVN, it may be because version 1.7 seems to need a new format for storing the status of files - in which case, you can right click the root folder of your repository in question, and use the Tortoise menu option of 'SVN Upgrade Working Copy'.
This resolved the problem for me.
Cheers Matt
To complete Johannes's answer, you can check this thread, which mentions another cause (the first one being installing the 32bit client instead of the 64 one) (emphasis mine):
Only more recent versions of TSVN and TCVS are able to share overlay icons, and since Explorer has a limit of 14 overlay images in total with extraneous overlay icons simply not showing up you might have too many...
If it's overlay icons are showing up you'd have to actually be using the 32-bit Windows Explorer, which of course means you'll have to also install a 32-bit version of TSVN.
The issue might come up when one install also first TortoiseVCS, because:
Looking at what got installed in the filesystem and the registry, it looks like they tried to do what I do with my Shell extensions - install both 64 and 32 -bit versions, so that nobody says "I don't see my overlays/menus"! ;)
Unfortunately, it looks like the registry entries for 32-bit got hosed, so the 32-bit extension DLL, even though present, does not have the correct registry entries.
If in doubt I suggest to deinstall TCVS and TSVN.
Then install TSVN.
Maybe after installation reboot twice, not only once.
And if they still don't show up go to software control panel and choose to repair the installation. That did the trick for me with when upgrading from the previous to the current version.You should probably install the TortoiseXYZ variant you plan to use mainly first, to improve its chances to fall into one of those limited number of overlay icons slots before the TortoiseXYZ variant you use less.
Always keep these limited number of overlay icon slots in mind when trying to analyze malfunctions.
If you want to use Tortoise from within a 32 bit Application on Windows 7 64 bit, you need to install both the 64bit and the 32bit versions of Tortoise. According to Tortoise's makers, this works fine. (source)
Kris Erickson is right, vote him up. In my case the problem was installing TFS powertools , which adds explorer shell integration just like TSVN and TCVS. It adds another 5 overlays. Since they are prefixed with Tfs*, they take priority over Tortoise*. I also just prefixed the Tfs stuff with z_ and the TSVN overlays came back. No need to reboot/logoff though, just kill explorer.exe and start it again.
rem Set your own path.
set TOOL_ROOT=d:\Tools\TortoiseSVN-1.6.13.20954-win32-svn-1.6.16\tortoisesvn_1.6.16.21511
set PACKAGENAME=TortoiseSVN-1.6.16.21511-x64-svn-1.6.17.msi
set TOOL_INSTALLROOT="c:\Program Files (x86)\TortoiseSVN"
msiexec /i "%TOOL_ROOT%\%PACKAGENAME%" INSTALLDIR=%TOOL_INSTALLROOT% ALLUSERS=1 ARPSYSTEMCOMPONENT=1 RebootYesNo=No REBOOT=ReallySupress /qb-
set ret=%ERRORLEVEL%
rem The installer seems to return same values as MSI
rem These codes mean that the product is properly installed, even though the code is not zero.
rem 1641 ERROR_SUCCESS_REBOOT_INITIATED
rem 3010 ERROR_SUCCESS_REBOOT_REQUIRED
if %ret% EQU 1641 set ret=0
if %ret% EQU 3010 set ret=0
if %ret% GTR 0 exit %ret%
If anyone needs the registry entries for Windows 7 64-bit, here they are. What was good for me as to remove the overlays for items not really used often: Drop Box, Google Drive, Microsoft Products, and just kept the overlays for Tortoise. These are all the overlays - nothing is removed.
** Caution ** Playing with the registry can make your system unstable. Be sure to backup your registry. See this Google search on various ways to backup your registry or registry setting(s).
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ AccExtIco1]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ AccExtIco2]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ AccExtIco3]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ SkyDrivePro1 (ErrorConflict)]
@="{8BA85C75-763B-4103-94EB-9470F12FE0F7}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ SkyDrivePro2 (SyncInProgress)]
@="{CD55129A-B1A1-438E-A425-CEBC7DC684EE}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\ SkyDrivePro3 (InSync)]
@="{E768CD3B-BDDC-436D-9C13-E1B39CA257B1}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt1"]
@="{FB314ED9-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt2"]
@="{FB314EDA-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt3"]
@="{FB314EDD-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt4"]
@="{FB314EDE-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt5"]
@="{FB314EDB-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt6"]
@="{FB314EDF-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt7"]
@="{FB314EDC-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\"DropboxExt8"]
@="{FB314EE0-A251-47B7-93E1-CDD82E34AF8B}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\00avast]
@="{472083B0-C522-11CF-8763-00608CC02F24}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\1EldosIconOverlay]
@="{AF743E58-5357-404B-8314-32D2D8420F9D}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\1TortoiseNormal]
@="{C5994560-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\2TortoiseModified]
@="{C5994561-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\3TortoiseConflict]
@="{C5994562-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\4TortoiseLocked]
@="{C5994563-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\5TortoiseReadOnly]
@="{C5994564-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\6TortoiseDeleted]
@="{C5994565-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\7TortoiseAdded]
@="{C5994566-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\8TortoiseIgnored]
@="{C5994567-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\9TortoiseUnversioned]
@="{C5994568-53D9-4125-87C9-F193FC689CB2}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\EldosIconOverlay]
@="{5BB532A2-BF14-4CCC-86B7-71B81EF6F8BC}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\EnhancedStorageShell]
@="{D9144DCD-E998-4ECA-AB6A-DCD83CCBA16D}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GDriveBlacklistedOverlay]
@="{81539FE6-33C7-4CE7-90C7-1C7B8F2F2D42}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GDriveSharedEditOverlay]
@="{81539FE6-33C7-4CE7-90C7-1C7B8F2F2D44}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GDriveSharedViewOverlay]
@="{81539FE6-33C7-4CE7-90C7-1C7B8F2F2D43}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GDriveSyncedOverlay]
@="{81539FE6-33C7-4CE7-90C7-1C7B8F2F2D40}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GDriveSyncingOverlay]
@="{81539FE6-33C7-4CE7-90C7-1C7B8F2F2D41}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\off0]
@="{8E33AEC3-C5F2-43C4-B048-9E3EB19B1DD5}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\off1]
@="{8E33AEC4-C5F2-43C4-B048-9E3EB19B1DD5}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\Offline Files]
@="{4E77131D-3629-431c-9818-C5679DC83E81}"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\SharingPrivate]
@="{08244EE6-92F0-47f2-9FC9-929BAA2E7235}"
Remember, these are for Windows 64-bit and you should take a backup of your registry be
I tried everything here (and some otherplaces), and what worked for me (after doing all of these, the registry changes are mandatory I think) was to change the setting for Icon Overlays\Status Cache from Default to Shell, and I also checked "Show overlays and context menu only in explorer". Not sure which of those two did it but it works now.
After upgrading to TSVN 1.6.8.19260 I had the same issue (no icons in Explorer), but in my case, there were NO entries at all for TSVN under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers. In my original install, I didn't included the additional icon sets, because I never use them (and I've never installed them in any previous upgrades).
I modified my installation, adding the additional icon sets, and my icons have magically reappeared.
My main purpose was to get ICONs for TortoiseCVS. Many of the suggestions did not work for me: uninstall reinstall; regedit by renaming; rebooting multiple times. But what did work was to install TortoiseSVN. This made the icons for TortoiseCVS work. I checked out regedit. The SVN install put numbers in front of the icon names:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers] 1TortoiseNormal 2TortoiseModified 3TortoiseConflict 4TortoiseLocked 5TortoiseReadOnly 6TortoiseDeleted 7TortoiseAdded 8TortoiseIgnored 9TortoiseUnversioned Groove Explorer Icon Overlay 1 (GFS Unread Stub) Groove Explorer Icon Overlay 2 (GFS Stub) Groove Explorer Icon Overlay 2.5 (GFS Unread Folder) Groove Explorer Icon Overlay 3 (GFS Folder) Groove Explorer Icon Overlay 4 (GFS Unread Mark) SharingPrivate TortoiseAdded TortoiseConflict TortoiseDeleted TortoiseIgnored TortoiseLocked TortoiseModified TortoiseNormal TortoiseReadOnly TortoiseUnversioned zEnhancedStorageShell zOffline Files zSkyDrivePro1 (ErrorConflict) zSkyDrivePro2 (SyncInProgress) zSkyDrivePro3 (InSync)
I had same problem here with TortoiseSVN 1.6.16. Icons were fine, but then I installed and uninstalled TortoiseGit and suddenly the TortoiseSVN icons stopped working. Looking at the registry I discovered that uninstalling TortoiseGit also removed all overlay icons. I simply reinstalled TortoiseSVN and it fixed the issue.
A combination of solutions worked for me. I tried to kill and restart explorer.exe as suggested by @LeighRiffel. Did not work. I uninstalled dropbox because I rarely use it. Then, I tried the explorer thing again and it worked. Maybe you can reinstall dropbox after this and see if things are okay ? I don't care though.
Here are the steps: Run taskmgr.exe or task manager > processes tab > select explorer.exe > kill. Then click file option > new task > enter explorer.exe > ok.
When I checked out a new project from the repository, I did not see the icon overlays.
I started looking for solutions and came to this question.
While reading answers, I noticed the icon overlays appeared on my checkout project.
I guess it just took a few minutes for the icons to appear.
I thought this might be useful before people panic quickly and start editing the registry.
Changing the registry worked for me.
If its helpful to anyone, I initially prefixed "z_" to the entries in "ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers" that I wanted to move down. However that didn't seem to bring up the TortoiseSVN entries. It might be due to case sensitivity wherein lowercase "z" still precedes uppercase "T". Finally, prefixing with "Z_" instead did the trick.