File association profiles and/or backup

[FilkerZero]

Description of the new feature / enhancement

It takes a while to set up file associations to match my workflow. There are several applications that will silently change those associations for every file type they support (Wondershare Uniconverter springs to mind, but is not the only one) forcing me to go back into settings and put them back the way I want them. Since there are dozens of file types affected, and a lot of different applications to choose from for some of them, this takes a lot of time and is quite annoying.

I would like a tool that simply backs up my file associations and allows me to restore them easily.

It can do this for all or selected file types. If it allows selection of the file types to save the associations for, this would allow a user to create profiles for their workflows, simply restoring the file associations stored in that profile.

I believe this would be a fairly straight forward tool to implement and that many people would find it useful.

Scenario when this would be used?

• Restoring users preferences after an application installer messes them up:

  1. User configures file associations with applications of their choice
  2. User saves the file associations in a file
  3. User updates or installs an application that unconditionally changes file associations for files it may be used on
  4. User notices that clicking on a file brings up the wrong application and is annoyed
  5. User restores the file associations from the file saved in step 2
  6. User is now no longer annoyed

• Workflow profiles

  1. User configures file associations for media files with application set A (eg, Nero)
  2. User saves current file associations for selected media file types in a profile named "Media Apps 1"
  3. User configures file associations for media files with application set B (eg, Adobe)
  4. User saves current file associations for selected media file types in a profile named "Media Apps 2"
  5. User wants to use application set A to create a video: User restores "Media Apps 1" profile
  6. User creates the video
  7. User wants to use application set B to refine the video and add special effects: User restores "Media Apps B" profile
  8. User refines the video

Supporting information

At it's simplest level, I believe this is simply saving off and restoring registry entries for file type associations.

Adding a dialog to display the known file types and allowing the user to select the settings to be saved will allow for profiles.

I don't think it's required to have a dialog to allow the user to select the settings to restore, but that would also be a nice option.

[technobulb]

This is really Windows 11 feedback... Dear Microsoft please stop breaking things.

[FilkerZero]

This is really Windows 11 feedback... Dear Microsoft please stop breaking things.

No argument from me on that, but being able to save off and restore file associations without having to wade through the registry and selectively saving entries into a .reg file would be a good thing.