How can I get the Name of the Program associated with a file extension using Delphi?
I need to get the name of the program currently associated with a file extension for the current user. If you right-click on a file and select properties, then what I need is the program name that is to the right of the "Opens with" line.
e.g. For ".xls", I want to be able to get the answer "Microsoft Office Excel", or whatever program the user has as their default program to open .xls files.
I have determined it's not as easy as just going into HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and picking it out, since it may also be specified in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE or HKEY_CURRENT_USER or HKEY_USERS.
Maybe all I need to know is the pecking order used by Windows to determine this and how to get to each of the locations. Of course, a Windows API call to do this would be ideal.
This is a similar question to: How to get icon and description from file extension using Delphi? but that question only answered how to get the description of the extension and the icon of the associated program. I couldn't find a way to extend that to also get the name of the associated program.
I'm using Delphi 2009 and need a solution that works on Windows XP, Vista and 7.
Thank you all for your answers.
It appears my belief that the name of the executable is not in the Registry after all. And after looking around extensively for a Windows API that will give the name, I could not find one.
I think Mef's answer then is the best. To get the name of the executable from the information included in the program's executable.
Followup: I found David Hefferman's answer to "How do I open a file with the default text editor?" gives an excellent solution for opening one program using the default program for a different extension.
Answer
Don't go spelunking in the registry when there are API functions designed to do what you need.
In your case, you want AssocQueryString. You can give it the file-name extension, and it will tell your the program registered to handle that extension (AssocStr_Executable). If you're planning on running that program to open a document, then you'll really want the command string instead of just the executable; AssocQueryString can give you that, too (AssocStr_Command). It can also tell you the document type like what's displayed in Windows Explorer, like "Text Document" or "Zip Archive" (AssocStr_FriendlyDocName).
That API function is a wrapper for the IQueryAssociations interface. If you're looking for programs from many file types, or lots of strings associated with a single type, you may wish to instantiate that interface and re-use it instead of calling the API function over and over.