Windows 10: How to add stuff in Windows Start menu search?

For example previously on Windows 10 I just used to type "CC" and CCleaner used to show up and I pressed enter.

Now I open start menu, type CC and it shows all web results.
How do I add a shortcut there?

:)

 

How to ADD a shortcut to "All Apps" menus in Start Menu W10

I want to add programs to "All Apps", the list is incomplete and as far as I know you cannot edit that menu at all. If I try to move (left-click or right-click) something in there, it asks me to "pin to start menu", which adds a shortcut to the Metro (tiles)
area ... not what I want (I don't use that, I reduced the start menu to one column, to look like Windows 7-ish.

People say that "All Apps" populates with everything I have installed on my computer. It doesn't. Most programs that are not in c:\program files have issues and won't list in there properly. I have programs installed on a secondary drive and most don't show.
And I can't add them to the menu.

So ... how to add a shortcut INSIDE ALL APPS (please do not answer with any "pin" solutions). Would be also nice if someone told me how to organize that mess (create folders, move stuff around. I was able to change SOME stuff by tweaking "C:\programData\Microsoft\Windows\Start
Menu\Programs", but I am not allowed (ever) to ADD anything in there, and some stuff can't be moved/deleted either.

 

How to add more tiles on Start menu in Windows 10?

How do I get more tiles? I have 4 columns of tiles now, is there a way to get more?

Thanks.

Original title: more tiles on start

 

You can always pin CCleaner to Start when the search has found it. Right click and choose Pin to Start (mine is already pinned hence the Unpin option).

 

But what about apps there aren't already there? How do I add those?
For example I simply cannot open uTorrent unless I open up a torrent file.

And I want uTorrent and CCleaner to show up in search. Not pin them to start where they will be visible permanently.

 

They should show up in search results if they're installed.

 

Well they ain't
Atleast uTorrent and CCleaner aren't showing up.
Yes, I ticked their options to install in start menu during their installations.

 

Check this out. Not even Windows Update is showing up in search.

 

I have the same problem with most of my apps (Firefox, Thunderbird, Sublime Text, Unity3D, LibreOffice, VLC ...). They have been installed using standard settings including start menu entries. These entries can be seen when navigating to "Start"->"All Apps" - but they won't show up in the search results of the start menu. They used to in Win7. Some of these programs like Pidgin or Notepad++ show up as "run command" if I search for their full name.

However, standard windows apps like Explorer show up when searching only for "e".

There is a reported bug that the start menu of the final Win10 build becomes unstable when having more than 512 entries. This does not seem to apply to this case as I have only 131 entries stored in "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu" and 31 stored in "%appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu".

This is a pure Win10 install without any migration of documents, settings or apps.

Does anybody else experience this problem? Has this been reported somewhere? Still no luck googling other users with this problem ...

Any possible workaround? Pinning the apps to "Start" won't bring them up in search either.


Btw, I'm not using the english version of Win10, so any commands and names I'm referring to have been translated by myself.

EDIT: wow, lolcocks - standard windows apps show up here in search. What settings did you activate/deactivate when Windows asked you at the first start? Do you have Cortana set up? Do you have a Microsoft account?

 

Hi there

1) don't use the search bar -I find it better to HIDE search bar - just select HIDE on search bar (mouse right click on bottom toolbar)

2) type anywhere in the menu area the name of your application - for utorrent I only needed to type ut before it found it.

3) simply click / double click the entry to run the application.

Cheers
jimbo

 

Thanks for your reply. I am not talking about the search bar, I have it hidden, too. I'm talking about the start menu, exactly the menu your screenshot shows. I have the feeling that this is not the expected user experience but that me and lolcocks somehow have run into a bug. Of course, restart doesn't help here.

 

Exactly what Neycroir said. He is having the same issue as me. These apps need to appear as desktop apps. They aren't. Registry entries probably aren't getting added. I too am using Windows 10 Pro clean install. That too got the ISO using Media Creation Tool. EDIT: Why the hell isn't a system app such as Windows Update not showing up in search? It was available till yesterday!

 

Do you have this setting enabled in Cortana Settings?

 

Hi there

I'm running build 10240 and RTM and it works on both machines. Have you applied the latest updates and done a re-boot.

I'm very happy with it now. Here's what Windows up (that's all I had to type --) shows - direct into the settings.
When I had typed win it was showing WINAMP which I have installed - so I just kept typing until windows update showed.

IMO works perfectly and really easy.


I don't know if activation (or lack of) causes any problems as you can't personalise your machine if not activated - I used the "bog standard" default settings anyway -- both these machines though are activated.

Cheers
jimbo

 

@lolcocks: in Win7 this was not dependent on registry settings. Start menu search simply looked what you typed up in places like "%appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu" - and what I and you are searching for is definitely stored in there!
@fracking4oil: no cortana active. Cortana needs an MS account which I do not want to have. Could you please test if you can still search for your desktop apps if you temporarily disable Cortana?
@jimbo45: I'm running the final build, I got it via MS' Media Creation Tool x64. I'm running the latest updates (30.07. 12:03 UTC+1) with the machine restarted. Windows 10 says it's activated (though I don't remember to have entered my product key ... remember this is a clean install and not an upgrade install from a running Win7.)

@all: I also upgraded my Tablet OS from 8.1 to 10 via Media Creation Tool x86. Start menu search works there as expected with no Cortana active. On the tablet I did an upgrade keeping all my files, settings and apps.