Hi,On my WIN XP SP3, I have found a registry entry HKCR\Connection Manager Profile. Its subkey Shell\Open\Command points to a file CMMGR32.EXE in System32 folder, but the file is not present over there.My questions are as:What is the use of this entry?What if I delete this entry?Is this key related to a Windows component that is un-installed on my system?How can we determine the validity of such keys?Thanks & Regards,-Abhay1 person got this answerI do too

What is the use of this entry?It looks like the Connection Manager was a feature that some people integrated into their custom applications in Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP:http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc778989(WS.10).aspxMore than likely the exe's are installed with such custom applications.Note: This key is not in Windows 7.What if I delete this entry?I tested this in a Virtual Machine and didn't experience any issues. You wouldn't see me deleting such keys on my main box because if it wasn't necessary it wouldn't have been included by default in the OS.Is this key related to a Windows component that is un-installed on my system?Nope, this comes standard with any Windows XP install.How can we determine the validity of such keys?I don't know of any database that contains a list of all registry keys and their validity. Considering the magnitude of such a database, I doubt one exists (but if one does I'm sure someone in the community probably knows of it).I briefly mentioned it above but I want to reiterate that I do not recommend "cleaning house" in the registry. Doing such causes far more problems than it solves. It's important to keep in mind that several registry keys are in place only for compatibility reasons (this key being a perfect example). Removing such keys may not cause immediate problems now but could hurt you later down the road.If you still want to experiment with deleting unfamiliar keys in the registry I'd highly recommend creating a virtual machine with Virtual PC and enabling Undo Disks. Cody C Microsoft Answers Support Engineer Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.