Extract Icon from Windows .lnk (shortcut) file

Question

I need to extract the icon from a windows shortcut (.lnk) file (or find the icon file, if it's just pointed to by the shortcut).

I'm not asking about extracting icons from exe's, dll's, etc. The shortcut in question is created when I run a installation program. And the icon displayed by the shortcut is not contained in the .exe that the shortcut points to. Presumably the icon is embedded in the .lnk file, or the .lnk file contains a pointer to where this icon lives. But none of the utilities I've found work address this -- they all just go to the .exe.

Many thanks!

Answer 1

Using the Shell32 method of acessing links:

String lnkPath = @"C:UsersPriceRDesktopMicrosoft Word 2010.lnk";
//--- run microsoft word
var shl = new Shell32.Shell();         // Move this to class scope
lnkPath = System.IO.Path.GetFullPath(lnkPath);
var dir = shl.NameSpace(System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(lnkPath));
var itm = dir.Items().Item(System.IO.Path.GetFileName(lnkPath));
var lnk = (Shell32.ShellLinkObject)itm.GetLink;
//lnk.GetIconLocation(out strIcon);
String strIcon;
lnk.GetIconLocation(out strIcon);
Icon awIcon = Icon.ExtractAssociatedIcon(strIcon);
this.button1.Text = "";
this.button1.Image = awIcon.ToBitmap();