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The places bar which appears in the left side of the Open and Save As dialog boxes in Windows XP, contains shortcuts to the following folders by default:

• Recent
• Desktop
• My Documents
• My Computer
• My Network Places

The default places can be customized by editing the registry. After adding/removing custom places using a third-party tool, you may experience a problem where the places bar is completely empty.

This happens if the following key is leftover in the registry, with no valid values present underneath it.

If the above key exists with no valid values (Place0, Place1, Place2, Place3 & Place 4), the list of places in the Common Dialog boxes will be empty. Removing the above branch fixes the problem. Use the steps below:

1. Click Start, Run. Type Regedit.exe and press ENTER

2. Navigate to the following location:

3. Right-click Placesbar and choose Delete

4. Exit the Registry Editor.

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