WiX minor upgrade remove Windows 7 taskbar pinned shortcut

Question

Every update to new version WiX for some reason removed pinned start menu shortcut from taskbar. How can I fix this?

Shortcut was created using this command:

   <DirectoryRef Id="ProgramMenuFolder">
      <Component Id="GitExtensions.newstartmenu" Guid="*">
        <Shortcut
          Id="GitExtensions.newstartmenu"
          Name="$(var.ProductName)"
          Description="$(var.ProductName)"
          Icon="gitextensions.ico"
          Target="[INSTALLDIR]GitExtensions.exe"
          WorkingDirectory="INSTALLDIR"/>
        <RegistryValue
          Root="HKCU" Key="$(var.InstalledRegKey)"
          Name="GitExtensions.newstartmenu" Value="" Type="string"
          KeyPath="yes"/>
      </Component>
    </DirectoryRef>

WiX code: https://github.com/gitextensions/gitextensions/blob/f9490e3e6e34cc2f6770fd9e1d6132cf5cfd0b0b/Setup/Product.wxs#L385-L399

Setup had been built in VS2010 + WiX 3.5.

Answer 1

It's actually doing a major upgrade and by scheduling RemoveExistingProducts early, the upgrade is removing the older version before installing the newer version. The shell removes the pin when the older shortcut is removed. You can try experimenting with a later scheduling of RemoveExistingProducts but note that there are costs associated with that.