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Sometimes, when I select a click a program on the Windows 7 taskbar it won't appear (it doesn't gain focus and remains behind other open windows), and the icon will flash and turn orange. This happens reasonably frequently, and I've had it happen on two separate Windows installs on different machines. It just happened now and the only programs I have with active windows are Chrome, WMP and Explorer (2). It happened when I clicked Explorer.

Once this has happened to one window, it affects all windows, and the only way I can switch between programs is by finding the window manually or using Windows+Tab. The only way I've come across to get the computer to snap out of this annoying behaviour is to restart the machine. Is there a way of stopping it?

JonathanDavidArndt
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fredley
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    I think this is a bug in Explorer... it's happened to me too, randomly. – user541686 Feb 04 '12 at 22:35
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    This appears to be focus stealing prevention not working correctly in Windows 7. This isn't exclusive to Explorer but is likely to be a problem with the Desktop Window Manager. – bwDraco Feb 05 '12 at 03:52
  • Happened to my girlfriend's laptop, she never restarted her laptop (only hibernating and resuming) for weeks, and it disappear upon restarting. And what do you know, it just happened to me too, in a fresh install to boot, and restarting Explorer (I used the Ctrl-Shit-RightClick Start menu to exit it, but I suppose simply end tasking would do) fix it. But yeah, maybe it will happen again after long running. – Martheen Mar 14 '12 at 03:41
  • @fredley did any of the answers solve your problem, else we might as well close it – Ivo Flipse Jul 15 '12 at 18:42
  • Could you try to close some programs from the tray? They may be interfering with the normal behaviour of the taskbar. I've also read that having certain usb devices connected during startup may cause the problem. – Geeklab Mar 25 '11 at 20:02
  • Which USB devices? I'd be interested to see your source for that information. – fredley Mar 25 '11 at 22:02
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    I had this problem, and it turned out that a systray menu was opened but not closed, and closing it fixed the problem. For me, it was "Apache Monitor" -- I had accidentally opened the context menu and then somehow left it open, and this caused the flashing buttons problem. Once I discovered it was open, I was able to close it and the problem went away. – ken Nov 27 '12 at 21:34
  • Had this problem over remote desktop. Clicking the "Show Desktop" button solved it for me. edit. Killing and restarting explorer.exe did not help. – thomasa88 Feb 13 '13 at 12:22

2 Answers2

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Ah, that video makes it more clear and even your mouse cursor icon seems to have issues, I would suggest:

  • Try updating video drivers.

  • Try disabling/enabling the Desktop Window Manager service.

  • Try disabling/enabling Aero.

  • Use ShellExView and try to disable non-Microsoft shell extensions, one might be bad behaving.

  • Try creating a new user account and migrating your stuff there.

As a last resort, I think you might need to reinstall...

Tamara Wijsman
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    The mouse cursor icon is just due to the recording software I'm using, normally it's fine. I have the latest drivers, and restarting explorer/dwm doesn't make the problem go away, only a restart fixes it. – fredley Mar 26 '11 at 11:26
  • And the other suggestions? – Tamara Wijsman Mar 26 '11 at 12:14
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    It hasn't happened for a while, and I don't know what causes it so can't reproduce the error. When it happens again I'll let you know. – fredley Mar 26 '11 at 12:18
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An anonymous (unregistered) user calling himself “Jonathan” tried to post the following:

The problem might be due to extended desktop you have. I tried to disable the other defined desktops and screens, but it didn’t help. Only after disabling the other screen through my video-card menu was the problem was solved.

(but he couldn’t, because the question is protected).

Scott - Слава Україні
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