DutyCat Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) I have this test generator program on my computer for my Earth and Space science classes. I have been using it for the past three years. Works great. No problems. Until today. I recently downloaded PKZIP software to unpack another application. Today, when I went to run my test generator program, the PK software jumped on it and is trying to treat it like a file that needs to be unzipped. I did not associate PKZIP with the program files. Anyone have any idea what is going on here? I don't know what the original file extensions were, but I deleted PKZIP and tried to get my program running again. However, now my computer is telling me that it needs to know what software to run to open up the program. I am running Win7 on a VAIO. VERY frustrating as it looks like I will have to reload my test generator software. Edited April 25, 2011 by DutyCat Quote Link to post Share on other sites
KursadA Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 Does the main executable for your test generator program have a filename extension? If it is simply an *.exe or a *bat, it should not be associated with any other program. My guess is that it might have an extension of some sort; that matches an obscure compressed file format that is among the file types that PKZIP can handle. I have this test generator program on my computer for my Earth and Space science classes. I have been using it for the past three years. Works great. No problems. Until today. I recently downloaded PKZIP software to unpack another application. Today, when I went to run my test generator program, the PK software jumped on it and is trying to treat it like a file that needs to be unzipped. I did not associate PKZIP with the program files. Anyone have any idea what is going on here? I don't know what the original file extensions were, but I deleted PKZIP and tried to get my program running again. However, now my computer is telling me that it needs to know what software to run to open up the program. I am running Win7 on a VAIO. VERY frustrating as it looks like I will have to reload my test generator software. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
galileo1 Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) I have this test generator program on my computer for my Earth and Space science classes. I have been using it for the past three years. Works great. No problems. Until today. I recently downloaded PKZIP software to unpack another application. Today, when I went to run my test generator program, the PK software jumped on it and is trying to treat it like a file that needs to be unzipped. I did not associate PKZIP with the program files. Anyone have any idea what is going on here? I don't know what the original file extensions were, but I deleted PKZIP and tried to get my program running again. However, now my computer is telling me that it needs to know what software to run to open up the program. I am running Win7 on a VAIO. VERY frustrating as it looks like I will have to reload my test generator software. Can't help much with PKZIP (heard of it but never tried it) but couldn't you try something like System Restore in Win 7? I know it doesn't always solve major problems but I've managed to fix small issues like this in the past. Don't even bother uninstalling your test generator until you try restoring your system to an earlier time (look at what restore points you have prior to your installation of PKZIP). HTH, Rob Edited April 25, 2011 by TOPGUN Quote Link to post Share on other sites
FlyingSnowmew Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) Right click on the file -> Open With -> whatever program you need. If the program is not listed, click on Choose default program and find it manually. There are numerous ways to change file defaults. There is no need to do a system restore. The last resort in this case would be to uninstall PKZIP. You should be able to do a custom install of it where you can choose what file types you want to associate with PKZIP, rather than a full install where it does the associations itself. Edited April 25, 2011 by Snowy Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DutyCat Posted April 25, 2011 Author Share Posted April 25, 2011 Does the main executable for your test generator program have a filename extension? If it is simply an *.exe or a *bat, it should not be associated with any other program. My guess is that it might have an extension of some sort; that matches an obscure compressed file format that is among the file types that PKZIP can handle. Can't help much with PKZIP (heard of it but never tried it) but couldn't you try something like System Restore in Win 7? I know it doesn't always solve major problems but I've managed to fix small issues like this in the past. Don't even bother uninstalling your test generator until you try restoring your system to an earlier time (look at what restore points you have prior to your installation of PKZIP). HTH, Rob Well, the file now has a "jar" extension. I don't know what that means. I have a duplicate of this program on my school computer, so I'll check it out tomorrow. All I know is before, I could go through my "All Programs" menu, select it, and it would activate right away and be ready to go. I don't really know how to do a system restore to a particular date. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DutyCat Posted April 25, 2011 Author Share Posted April 25, 2011 Right click on the file -> Open With -> whatever program you need. If the program is not listed, click on Choose default program and find it manually. There are numerous ways to change file defaults. I have NO idea what the program used to open and run the application is. When Ido the internet search thing, it goes to PKZIP as a suggestion. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
FlyingSnowmew Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) Well, the file now has a "jar" extension. I don't know what that means. I have a duplicate of this program on my school computer, so I'll check it out tomorrow. All I know is before, I could go through my "All Programs" menu, select it, and it would activate right away and be ready to go. I don't really know how to do a system restore to a particular date. .jar is a Java ARchive. In other words a Java program. PKZIP is thinking of it as a normal archive. Open the .jar with Java and it should run fine. Right click -> Open With -> Choose default program -> C: -> Program Files -> Java -> jre[version number] -> bin -> Java. You're probably better off uninstalling PKZIP and reinstalling it, but choosing the file associations. Depending on what you need from it, I would recommend 7zip as it is free and you get to choose the file associations on installation. Edited April 25, 2011 by Snowy Quote Link to post Share on other sites
galileo1 Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) I don't really know how to do a system restore to a particular date. Well, not much to it (if you want to go this route). Here's How: 1. Navigate to the Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools program group. 2. Click on the System Restore program icon. 3. Click Next > on the Restore system files and settings window. 4. Choose the restore point that you want to use. Note: Check the Show more restore points checkbox to see more than the most recent restore points. Note: Any restore points that you created, scheduled restore points that Windows 7 created, and those created automatically during the installation of certain programs will be listed here. You can not use System Restore to undo Windows 7 changes to a date that a restore point does not exist. 5. Click Next >. 6. Click Finish on the Confirm your restore point window to begin the System Restore. Note: Windows 7 will shut down to complete the System Restore so be sure to save any work you might have open in other programs before continuing. 7. Click Yes to the Once started, System Restore cannot be interrupted. Do you want to continue? dialog box. 8. System Restore will now restore Windows 7 to the state that was recorded in the restore point you chose in Step 4. 9. Immediately after logging in to Windows 7 after the reboot, you should see a message that System Restore completed successfully. 10.Click Close. 11. Check to see if whatever Windows 7 problem you were troubleshooting has been corrected by this System Restore. Again, if you want to go this route these are the procedures. Easy and fast as opposed to searching for things you're not even sure of. As long as all you want at this point is to have your generator work as before this is the way I'd go. As I said, it has helped me more than once to restore files (corrupted and otherwise) on many of my applications to the way they were when I first installed them. My opinion here, of course. Choose the method you feel most comfortable with. Rob Edited April 25, 2011 by TOPGUN Quote Link to post Share on other sites
KursadA Posted April 25, 2011 Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) You don't need to do a full system restore to correct this. It looks like your test generator application was written in Java, and it was a Java application with the *.JAR extension. *.JAR file format is primarily the same as the *.TAR archive format, which is very commonly used on Unix systems but not so much on Windows/Mac. For this reason, many compression/decompression utilities add JAR to the list of file formats they can handle. I would remove *JAR from the list of files handled by PKZIP, and associate it with the Java runtime. THis should fix the problems you're having. It looks like this is a very common problem, and someone wrote a program called "Jarfix" to fix it. Here is the link: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Others/Miscellaneous/Jarfix.shtml Edited April 25, 2011 by KursadA Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DutyCat Posted April 25, 2011 Author Share Posted April 25, 2011 Thanks so very much! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DutyCat Posted April 25, 2011 Author Share Posted April 25, 2011 (edited) .jar is a Java ARchive. In other words a Java program. PKZIP is thinking of it as a normal archive. Open the .jar with Java and it should run fine. Right click -> Open With -> Choose default program -> C: -> Program Files -> Java -> jre[version number] -> bin -> Java. You're probably better off uninstalling PKZIP and reinstalling it, but choosing the file associations. Depending on what you need from it, I would recommend 7zip as it is free and you get to choose the file associations on installation. Well, I tried your directions. I get what appears to be a momentary DOS window, then nada! No application launch. Also, the program files are located in a folder called Program Files(x86). I bought a new computer recently, but I thought I had already successfully activated the program in my new Win7 machine. Maybe I haven't yet and I am thinking about my old Dell. Edited April 25, 2011 by DutyCat Quote Link to post Share on other sites
ElectroSoldier Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 I would try what KursadA suggests, then if it doesnt work reinstall the application that runs your generator software... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.