Why short-name for Processes in Task Manager?

4 posts · originally from https://geek.digit.in/community/threads/why-short-name-for-processes-in-task-manager.82476/

When we open Task Manager in Windows, then we can see the processes running under the current user's context. Sometimes it happens that the names of the processes are shown with short file names such as MyNote~1.exe instead of MyNotepad.exe.
Why this happens? Does anybody knows? While searching for the answers it seems automation does this for COM exes. But what about non-COM exes? In my computer sometimes I see the names for non-COM exes also changed to short names.

I think it also happens wid temporary files loaded in memory.........

such as word document temp file created while editing/opening.... :))

Instead of task manager u could try Process Explorer it is better then
task manager as it shows more details abt processses.... :grin:

quite useful

Why I am asking this is because we want to get the list of all the processes running under current user. There is a API which returns the process names. But sometimes it contains the short-name for processes. Why these short-names appear? And under what circumstances ? I cannot find any explanation after searching for it over internet.

I am not sure about it but some times the Long File Name of a file becomes corrupt or something, i mean its entry in directory entry becomes corrupt and at that time windows shows short names, although this type of problem is very rare in Windows XP and up systems.