Changing Selection Behavior

[Ascii2]

Microsoft Windows operating systems released prior to the release of Windows XP family operating systems (referred hereinafter as "Windows XP") have a different behavior when selecting a range of icons.

In Windows XP, exceptions notwithstanding, when a range is selected by "Shift" key clicking its endpoints or shifting endpoints by holding "Shift" key and using navigation keys (See Note 1) to move an endpoint, all icons to the right (horizontally) of the uppermost endpoint, all icons to the left of the lowermost endpoint, and all rows of icons between the endpoints are selected. An exception to this behavior the directions of left and right do not seem to be consistent when Extended Desktop is used. On an Extended Desktop, endpoints selected on a single display may have different icons selected on the Desktop than when the same endpoints are selected in opposite order (this could be a design defect).

In prior Windows releases, selection of the endpoints for a range icon selection would result is a simple array (one or two dimensional) of selected icons.

The newer behavior in Windows XP is problematic because it easily yields undesirable selections, especially on an Extended Desktop (where icons may be selected on multiple monitors when selection on only a single monitor is desired).

How can the range selection as was in prior Windows releases be applied to Windows XP?

Notes:

Note 1: Navigation Keys are Left Arrow key, Right Arrow key, Up Arrow key, Down Arrow key, Home key, End key, Page Up key, and Page Down key.

Edited February 5, 2010 by Ascii2

[Nile]

Hey, I figured it out!

Right-click on the desktop, click views --> classic icons

Voila! That's it, old behavior is back... I understand why it work this way, if you go in explorer and try icons, you can see that they are classified but in rows from left to right also instead of columns by columns like a journal. Therefore you need this behavior of catching the left to right items to grab everything in alphabetical order, what shift click is intended for in the first place.

Hope it helps, I hope other people will find this through google, I registered here just to post this haha.

[Sp0iLedBrAt]

Welcome aboard Nile, and thank you for the solution.

Enjoy

[Ascii2]

Hey, I figured it out!

Right-click on the desktop, click views --> classic icons

I was not able to reproduce your solution.

When I right click on the Windows XP Professional Desktop, there is no "views" available.