As everyone knows, you can buy many different brands of toothpaste, shampoo, cars, and just about every other kind of product. The same is true of software. Everyone uses a web browser to browse the Internet, and you have many different web browsers to choose from. One is Microsoft Edge, which comes with Windows 10. Others are Internet Explorer, Opera, Firefox, and Google Chrome, to name a few.
If you're looking for a media player, Windows 10 comes with Media Player. In addition, you can choose QuickTime, Musicbee, and many others. When you have two or more programs capable of handling the same type of file, consider making one the default program that opens automatically when you open that type of file. Setting such defaults is what this chapter is all about.
Typed text, pictures, music files, and video clips are all examples of documents and other types of files that you can create or download to your computer. Thousands of file types exist. Each type is indicated by its filename extension. For example, a picture may be a JPEG (.jpeg
or .jpg
), BMP (.bmp
), GIF (.gif
), TIFF (.tif
or .tiff
), PNG (.png
), or any of a couple of dozen other formats.
When you click (or double-click) a file icon while in File Explorer, the file opens in whatever is the default program for its type. If you have more than one program that can open the file type, you can override the default and open the file with some other program. Right-click the file's icon and choose Open With, as shown in Figure 26.1. The Open With option is available only if you have two or more programs installed that can open that type of file.
If you want to keep the current default program for this type of file, and override that just this time, click the name of the program you want to use to open the file.
If you want to change the default program that Windows always uses to open that type of file, click Choose Another App at the bottom of the Open With menu. The Open With dialog box opens. An example of this box when a .jpg
file is selected is shown in Figure 26.2.
Click whatever program you want to use for opening that type of document. Also, make sure the Always Use This App To Open <filetype> Files option is selected (checked). Otherwise your new choice isn't saved.
If you can't find the program you want to use as the default, you can click the More Apps link to look for it (you may need to scroll down the list to see this link). Just make sure that the program you want to use is capable of opening that type of document.
Setting default programs using the Open With dialog box is just one way to do it. Many programs have options within them that enable you to choose which file types you want to associate with the program. The settings within the program might even override the settings you specify in Windows. So sometimes you have to go into the program that's acting as the default for a file type and make a change there.
Unfortunately, no single rule applies to the hundreds of programs that allow you to change associations within a program. Typically you start by opening the program and choosing Tools ⇨ Options or Edit ⇨ Preferences, or something similar, to get to the program's main options. To illustrate, we'll use QuickTime as an example because many people have that program.
In QuickTime, you first open the QuickTime Player from the Windows 10 Start menu. Then choose Edit ⇨ Preferences ⇨ QuickTime Preferences from its menu bar. Select the Browser tab, click File Types, and you're taken to a dialog box where you can specify file types that should open automatically in QuickTime. Select the file types you want to open in QuickTime automatically. Clear the check marks for those file types for which QuickTime should not act as the default program. Figure 26.3 shows an example.
When you associate a program with a file type, make sure to specify a program that can open files of that type. For example, don't associate video or audio files with Word or Excel because those programs don't play multimedia files.
If the program you're setting up does not have a preferences option, open Control Panel, select All Control Panel Options, Default Programs, Set Your Default Programs, and then choose Set This Program As Default from the dialog box that loads.
Right-clicking a document's icon and choosing Choose Another App is the quick and easy way to set a default program on the fly, but it isn't the only method, and you aren't limited to setting defaults based on file types. You can also set defaults for protocols. A protocol is a standardized way of doing something. Different Internet services use different protocols. For example, web browsing uses HTTP, which stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol.
You can also set default actions for CDs, DVDs, and devices you connect to your computer. Use the Default Programs page in the Control Panel to set all these different kinds of defaults. To get there, use whichever method is easiest for you:
You see the options shown in Figure 26.4 and summarized here.
The following sections describe each option.
The first item in Default Programs lets you choose which file types and protocols you want to associate with programs. When you click Set Your Default Programs, you're taken to a page like the one in Figure 26.5.
Click a program name in the left column to see a description of that program in the right column. Then you can choose one of the following options:
Choosing the second option takes you to a list of all the file types and protocols that the program supports, as shown in Figure 26.6. You can scroll through the list and select the file types and protocols for which the program should act as default. Clear the check box of any file type or protocol for which you want some other program to act as the default. Then click Save to return to the previous page.
When you've finished choosing defaults for programs, click OK to return to the main Default Programs page.
You also can choose a default app for Windows 10 apps from the Windows 10 Settings page. Open the Start menu and select Settings. When the Windows 10 Settings page opens, click System and then select Default Apps. The screen shown in Figure 26.7 loads.
In Figure 26.7, we haven't chosen a default program for the Photo Editor app. To select a default program click the Choose a Default link next to the program that has no default. The menu shown in Figure 26.8 loads. Continue to select the program you want to use.
The second option in Default Programs is similar to the first. But instead of starting with a program, you start with a file type or protocol. When you click Choose Default Apps by Protocol, you see options similar to those in Figure 26.9.
File types are listed first, in alphabetical order. Protocols are separate at the bottom of the list. Use the scroll bar to scroll through the list. To assign a default program to a file type or protocol, click the item you want to change and click the Change Program button. Then use the Open With dialog box that opens to choose a program.
Choosing default apps by file type and/or protocol is also possible from Settings. Click the respective link at the bottom of the Associate a File Type or Protocol With Specific Apps page.
AutoPlay is a Windows feature that lets you choose which program you want to use to play content on CDs, DVDs, and devices (such as MP3 devices). Chances are you've already seen the AutoPlay screen at least once, after you inserted a CD or DVD, or connected a camera, mobile phone, or disk drive. Figure 26.10 shows an example.
Click the AutoPlay screen to see a list of actions to take. The AutoPlay dialog box lets you choose the action you want to take with the selected media. For a removable device that always has pictures on it, you might choose one of the Import Pictures and Videos options. Or, as the example in Figure 26.11 shows, the actions for the iPad that we connected to our computer include open in Microsoft Word, Import Pictures and Videos, and Open Device To View Files. Until you set a default AutoPlay option, however, Windows continues to ask you what you want to do when you attach the device.
When you click Change AutoPlay Options in the Control Panel, you get to see all your current AutoPlay default settings, as in Figure 26.12. You can also get there by clicking Change AutoPlay Settings in the Default Programs item in the Control Panel. Scroll to the bottom of the list to find icons for devices you connect to your computer, such as digital cameras.
To change the default action for any item, click the current action and choose the action you want from the menu that drops down. Click Save after making your changes to return to Program Defaults.
Anybody who has a user account can choose defaults using any of the methods described in this chapter. The Set Program Access and Computer Defaults option (see Figure 26.13) is strictly for computer administrators. It sets defaults that apply to all user accounts, and can even be used to limit programs that they can use. This is most often used in corporate settings when administrators want tight control over how staff members use their computers. But anyone with an administrative user account on a home computer can use it to control family members' program use as well.
Because the Set Program Access and Computer Defaults option can so severely limit what all users can do, you need administrative privileges just to start it. If you're in a standard user account, you need to log out. Then log in to an administrative account to open that option. When you first open it, you see these three options:
After you choose one of these options, more options appear under that category. The exact options vary depending on what you choose. But they work in a similar manner. We'll use the Custom category, shown in Figure 26.13, as an example, because it offers the most options.
As shown in Figure 26.13, the first options let you choose the default web browser, e-mail client, and media player for online music and video. Scrolling down enables you to choose a default instant messaging program and Java virtual machine. The options available to you depend on what programs you have installed on your computer at the moment. For each program, you have the following options:
Program Name
>: To specify a program as the default, click the option button to the left of its name.Sometimes you can't choose exactly the option you want. Other times, when you choose an option, the selected program doesn't comply. That's because the programmers who create these programs aren't required to make them work with the Program Defaults selections. If that's a problem, your only recourse is to contact the program publisher. They may have a newer version that's compatible with setting program defaults in Windows 10.
Click OK when you've finished making your selections. You may see a message stating that your choices may not work because of current file associations. If you click Yes, Windows 10 tries to change the file associations to go with the new default program automatically. If that step doesn't work, you can change file associations manually.
Default programs are programs that start automatically when you open a document or use an Internet protocol such as e-mail or the web. When you have two or more programs that can open a document or use an Internet protocol, you can choose which one acts as the default. Choosing a default doesn't preclude using other programs. The default only determines which program is used when you don't specify otherwise. Windows 10 offers several methods of choosing default programs: