Windows 10: Desktop/Win32 apps missing from Start Menu "All Apps" and search

Hi, I'm having an issue and I'm wondering if anyone else has any ideas on what to do about it.

Some desktop apps are missing from the "All apps" section of the Start menu. Most programs are there, but I'd say 10-15% are missing. Apps that are missing also do not show up when searching the Start menu, and they cannot be pinned to the Start screen as tiles from File Explorer. (The option to "Pin to Start" is there, but selecting it doesn't do anything.)

I have a screenshot here of Outlook 2013 missing from the Start menu even though it is present in the "Start Menu" programs shortcut folder. This is one of many examples.





I've tried resetting the Windows Search index a few times and that hasn't done any good.

Additionally, I've tried adding my own shortcuts and folders to the "Start Menu" programs folder and the changes do not reflect on the Start menu "All apps" section. It's as if it has cached the structure somewhere and it is not updating for changes (or it is ignoring some changes). I tried to figure out some way to kick it into resetting but I have not been successful.

Anyone else seen something like this or have any places to look?

Thanks.

:)

 

Alive Google Chrome Start Menu Shortcut

This is the same issue as:

Some Win32 apps missing from Start menu "All Programs" list and search

Some Win32 apps missing from Start menu "All Programs" list and search

 

Win 10 App failure to open or failure to function.

When attempting to open app from the "all apps" start menu a blank window will appear for a second then disappear. or when attempting to open an app from the desktop start menu a similar reaction. I have deleted all apps from the start menu and done the
"time/location change" to no effect. I have NOT attempted to change registry values as recommended on one site. BUT this issue seems quite common from all the discussion on the web.

 

Windows search has nothing to do with the Metro side of things. You really need to be using either Classic Shell or Start10 to be able to see those items on the desktop.

Until Microsoft has the fixes ready by the 29th, there are going to be issues with this Trialware. It is going to take at least a year under Microsoft's timeline, before they have 10 completed, even though users are using it as their OS on the 29th and beyond.

 

Yeah, this happened to me a couple of times. I never got it resolved. The first time I had to do a clean install and the second time a reboot seemed to resolve it.

You can try the suggestions in the thread I made about it: Solved Can't pin programs to Start menu anymore? - Page 2 - Windows 10 Forums

Let us know if you have any joy.

 

Thanks for your replies. I think it's too late to hope for a bunch of fixes before the 29th --- they've been pushing updates almost daily, and I'm sure small stuff is getting fixed here and there, but what we have now is pretty much what everyone is going to get on the 29th. There are going to be bugs and they will be pushing out fixes for months, and they won't be able to do it as fast as they are now once the software has gone GA. They know (or at least I hope they know) that if a forced reboot pops up every other day, people won't have a good first impression of Windows 10, and they really need a good first impression at this point.

In my case, this issue started happening immediately after my upgrade from Windows 8.1 (which was last week Thursday, I went directly to 10240). I noticed that a few apps were missing when I was trying to build out my new Start screen layout.

I did install Visual Studio 2015, and it is one of the apps that I cannot find in "All apps" (though I can find some other items that came along with it like "VS2015 x86 Native Tools Command Prompt"). However, this problem was occurring before Visual Studio 2015 was installed.

Doing a clean Windows install is not an option, it would take too long to get everything back in working order and I don't have time for that. Yes, I realize that upgrading to Windows 10 early brought some risk along, and I'm honestly fine with the situation. I've been able to work through all of the other issues that came up. I'll just have to work out another solution for Start menu app search. I might use Start10 for a while. Since other users are reporting the issue, chances are higher that Microsoft will fix it... eventually.

[Edit]
Installed Start10 trial and rather impressed with it. It has a lot of options and seems well suited for a "power user." I also like how it's still easy to pull up the "regular" Windows 10 Start menu so that I can check on the status of this issue. But honestly I might stick with Start10 anyway.

 

Hello, did you managed to fix that, I just created a thread but seems we are facing the same problem.

Missing applications in Start Menu after upgrading from 7 to 10 - Windows 10 Forums



For Outlook and other Office apps you can fix this by doing a repair on Office in Programs and Functions

 

On the Microsoft forum, a MS person has stated that this is known to happen if you have more than 512 apps installed. This is the case for me (I have 700+ according to the PowerShell command mentioned). They are working on a fix.

Some Win32 apps missing from Start menu list - Microsoft Community

 

Maybe it's different problem, however I have fixed the issue myself, the apps that were missing were in c:\windows.old... path under Menu Start of <All Users> and not particular user and seems that during update from win7 to win10 only the Menu Start apps from <User> were copied to Apps, but not <All Users> hence these were not there, easy fix (if you didn't remove windows.old after upgrade)