I'd like to change the url icon in my IE7 Favorites listing for a particular site from the default icon for IE url's to the icon for the site. The site is http://www.mywot.com/en/forum . Most of my url icons have the site icons (for example this one here with a "picture" of a geek, google, photobucket, comodo, avira, cnet, etc.). I'm pretty sure the site designer included a favicons.ico file in their HTML because in FF it shows up, both in the address bar and in the bookmark.

Right clicking the url only gives me the properties from which I can change the icon to something on my machine (for example, the moricons.dll file). That's NOT what I want to do. I want the url icon of the site. I tried deleting the url from my favorites and then adding it back because I think that in IE it only does the site url icon if you bookmark it . . . whereas in FF it will do it if you just visit the site.

I thought about deleting the url icon cache (if there even is one and if I could find it), but then I thought that would probably reset all my url icons to the default.

I vaguely remember reading something on this and that there was a way to do it, but that may have been all the way back in IE5 or something.

So, this is apparently one more argument for those that consider FF superior to IE.

In any case, this is more cosmetic than anything else, and is really no big deal. But it does make it easier on the eyes when looking through the Favorites list. And at my age I need to do all I can to make things easier on these old eyes.

(BTW, I'm posting this in FF right now).

Hey Rick,

I think you misunderstood my question . . . or else I misunderstood your answer.

I DON'T want the default icon. I want the icon that the site url displays.

Let me see if I can 'splain it with images.

This is what I see in IE:

And this is what I see in FF:

And if it was that the particular browser needed to be the default browser to display the site url icon . . . well, FF has never been my default browser, and it displays some of the url icons as the site url icons.

And if it were dependent on which browser were first used to bookmark the url . . . again, I have bookmarked some url's in IE and they still display as the site url icon in FF . . . Comodo is a good example. You can see in the images that the Comodo site url icon displays in BOTH browsers. Avira's red umbrella is an example of that too.

Anyway, the one I'm trying to change is the WOT (it's the first url in both browser's links) in IE from the default to the green donut displayed in FF. BTW, I bookmarked WOT in IE first, and as I said, it was the default browser.

And I tried your tip of changing default browsers, and IE still displayed it's default icon for WOT and FF displayed the green donut (the site url icon).

So, am I misunderstanding your reply, or are you misunderstanding my issue??

@Bob,
@ScottW,

I am having a bit of problem understanding (after reading the links) what you guys are trying to explain.

The icon shown from a downloaded URL link is being (pulled), so to speak, from the server file it self. Once the link is broken or disconnected, then the URL stands on its own and reverts back to the system icon for the URL link. One can change the link icon to a system icon. Since URL link files have no (embedded) icons, I am having trouble understanding. Once one goes off-line, there is no icon but a system icon which can be applied I thought???

Since I always CLEAR ALL cashes before shutting the machines down, there will be nothing in ALL cashes to include browser cashes.
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Please try to explain how one keeps, for instance a MS (Little Blue M Icon) from a MS Technet Article URL which one might save to favorites ?? I've never been able to do it. I just get a standard system icon after disconnecting from the net and change the standard system URL link icon to some other system icon on the system.
Kindest Regards,
Rick P. ♥ :)

jd2066,

Now that I think about it, you are probably most correct just as I can grab music files from the cashes in some cases.

It never came to mind as I always do heavy duty nightly maintenance on the computer I have run all day so everything would be cleaned-up and out for the next secession.

Thanks Much because I never thought about the issue. Just made my own icons (LOL).

Your reply gives me an interesting programing idea !!

Kindest Regards,
Rick P. ♥ :)

Clearly my paragraphs didn't communicate accurately, nor did my images, because Rick didn't get much (though his explanation of how url icons are from the server file is informative), and ScottW maybe got it a little more . . . so, at the risk of sounding like that fool pepsi666, I'm going to try bullet items now:

* My issue is NOT about Desktop Icons. (And this I think is the part Rck got and ScottW got only partially)

* My issue concerns the little URL icons in IE7, as shown in my images.

Now ScottW came close, but the thrust of his post and the thread he linked to was DESKTOP ICONS. While the procedure would actually be the same anyway (right clicking the URL shortcut in the browser yields the same "Properties>Change Icon" as doing the same to the URL shortcut on the Desktop), this does not answer my question (this is the part where I sound like that Village Idiot pepsi666) BECAUSE I was unable to find the WOT favicons file in the IE7 icon cache. In fact, other than the WOT icon showing up in FF (see the FF image . . . second one . . . green donut icon next to the first URL), I don't think there's a WOT favicon file on that website.

I looked at the source code for that WOT site and I didn't see any HTML reference to a favicons file. Apparently FF doesn't depend on a favicons file. But I'm not real sure about that because I'm not all that familiar with how favicons files are coded into a web design, or with how FF reads url icons.

I tried a few other things too, in an effort to get at that favicons file for WOT. There is not a WOT .exe, it's only a .dll and it's an add-on toolbar to both IE and FF (it's comparable to McAfee's Site Advisor . . . it is a link "safety" check, mostly used for Google searches . . . "WOT" is their acronym for "Web of Trust").

I thought that maybe the WOT .dll had the WOT icon in it, but I got that "The file . . . contains no icons" error.

I followed ScottW's procedure to look in the IE icon cache . . . plenty of favicon files but not one for WOT in there.

I searched for .ico files . . . have many but no joy on WOT there either.

I looked for an FF icon cache, but couldn't find one (it probably doesn't exist)

I opened FF, went to the WOT site and right clicked, but the FF drop down menu doesn't have a "create shortcut" selection like the IE menu does.

I have a program that extracts icons from all the files on your computer that have icons (mostly .exe's and .dll's), but nothing on WOT there either.

I haven't tried changing themes or resolution or deleting the icon cache for Desktop Icons yet, but that's obviously only for Desktop Icons and not little URL shortcut icons in browsers.

So, ScottW . . . what next?? And why does it show up in FF, and only the default image in IE?? (see my screenshots above)

(And BTW, Rick, even when I'm on line IE shows that WOT link with a default icon. And those links that show a site url icon when you're offline get them from the favicon in the IE url icon cache. Thus, if you clear all caches, then that's probably why yours show up as default. As I said in my first post, I think you have to actually do a bookmark in IE to get it to read the server favicon file. You might try to bookmark a site again and see if the favicon shows up . . . this site would be a good one to experiment on because I know there is a HTG favicon.)

OK . . . problem solved. Here's the deal (did a lot of research and Googling):

The site designer for that WOT site did NOT include a favicon file in the format of .ico in the HTML. Instead, the site designer used a .png format image for the favicon. FF will display .png images as favicons, but in IE the favicon must be of the .ico image format in order to be rendered in IE. Otherwise IE will display the default Internet Explorer shortcut icon.

I got the WOT favicon .png image from the designer, downloaded it, and then changed the format from .png to .ico with IrfanView. Then I was able to do the "Properties>Change Icon" stuff for the url shortcut in IE7. Then I marked the url shortcut attribute as "Read Only" so the icon will stay that way.

Phewww . . . this was bugging me and I wouldn't let go of it 'till I found the answer. Now I can get some sleep.