How to refresh/reload Desktop

Thanks for all your replies and comments. I finally figured out a workaround for this problem. We could just hide all desktop icons and then show them again. This will force the desktop to reload.

Update: In Window 8, SHELLDLL_DefView is the child of one of WorkerW windows. (instead of Progman) So here is the updated code which works on Windows 8 and 8.1 too:

    [DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern IntPtr FindWindow(string lpClassName, string lpWindowName);

    [DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern IntPtr GetWindow(IntPtr hWnd, GetWindow_Cmd uCmd);

    [DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
    static extern IntPtr SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd, UInt32 Msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam);

    enum GetWindow_Cmd : uint
    {
        GW_HWNDFIRST = 0,
        GW_HWNDLAST = 1,
        GW_HWNDNEXT = 2,
        GW_HWNDPREV = 3,
        GW_OWNER = 4,
        GW_CHILD = 5,
        GW_ENABLEDPOPUP = 6
    }

    private const int WM_COMMAND = 0x111;

    [DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern IntPtr FindWindowEx(IntPtr hwndParent, IntPtr hwndChildAfter, string lpszClass, string lpszWindow);

    private delegate bool EnumWindowsProc(IntPtr hWnd, IntPtr lParam);

    [DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]
    private static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder strText, int maxCount);

    [DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]
    private static extern int GetWindowTextLength(IntPtr hWnd);

    [DllImport("user32.dll")]
    private static extern bool EnumWindows(EnumWindowsProc enumProc, IntPtr lParam);

    [DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
    static extern int GetClassName(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder lpClassName, int nMaxCount);


    public static string GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd)
    {
        int size = GetWindowTextLength(hWnd);
        if (size++ > 0)
        {
            var builder = new StringBuilder(size);
            GetWindowText(hWnd, builder, builder.Capacity);
            return builder.ToString();
        }

        return String.Empty;
    }

    public static IEnumerable<IntPtr> FindWindowsWithClass(string className)
    {
        IntPtr found = IntPtr.Zero;
        List<IntPtr> windows = new List<IntPtr>();

        EnumWindows(delegate(IntPtr wnd, IntPtr param)
        {
            StringBuilder cl = new StringBuilder(256);
            GetClassName(wnd, cl, cl.Capacity);
            if (cl.ToString() == className && (GetWindowText(wnd) == "" || GetWindowText(wnd) == null))
            {
                windows.Add(wnd);
            }
            return true;
        },
                    IntPtr.Zero);

        return windows;
    }

    static void ToggleDesktopIcons()
    {
        var toggleDesktopCommand = new IntPtr(0x7402);
        IntPtr hWnd = IntPtr.Zero;
        if (Environment.OSVersion.Version.Major < 6 || Environment.OSVersion.Version.Minor < 2) //7 and -
            hWnd = GetWindow(FindWindow("Progman", "Program Manager"), GetWindow_Cmd.GW_CHILD);
        else
        {
            var ptrs = FindWindowsWithClass("WorkerW");
            int i = 0;
            while (hWnd == IntPtr.Zero && i < ptrs.Count())
            {
                hWnd = FindWindowEx(ptrs.ElementAt(i), IntPtr.Zero, "SHELLDLL_DefView", null);
                i++;
            }
        }
        SendMessage(hWnd, WM_COMMAND, toggleDesktopCommand, IntPtr.Zero);
    }

Now we can just toggle desktop icons twice:

        ToggleDesktopIcons();
        ToggleDesktopIcons();

Hope this helps someone else ...

If you would have posted the code to change that setting, I would have tested it against the following suggestions before replying.

Have you tried:

1) Removing the statement if (itemName == "Windows Explorer") from the above code, so it refreshes every window (including the desktop)?

2) Broadcasting a WM_SETTINGCHANGE via SendMessage WIN32 API?

private const int HWND_BROADCAST = 0xffff;
private const int WM_WININICHANGE = 0x001a, WM_SETTINGCHANGE = 0x001a, INI_INTL = 1;
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern int SendMessage(int hWnd, uint wMsg, uint wParam, uint lParam);

SendMessage(HWND_BROADCAST, WM_SETTINGCHANGE, 0, INI_INTL);

[Credit]

3) IActiveDesktop.ApplyChanges

[ComImport]
[Guid("F490EB00-1240-11D1-9888-006097DEACF9")]
[InterfaceType(ComInterfaceType.InterfaceIsIUnknown)]
public interface IActiveDesktop
{
     [PreserveSig]
     int ApplyChanges(AD_Apply dwFlags);
     // [...]
     // Note: There is a lot more to this interface,
     //        please see PInvoke.net link below.
}
private const int AD_APPLY_REFRESH = 4;

IActiveDesktop.ApplyChanges(AD_APPLY_REFRESH);

[PInvoke.net - IActiveDesktop]

If these do not work, let me know. If it comes down to it, it is possible to save all the open explorer windows & their positions, terminate explorer, wait for explorer to restart, re-open each explorer window and re-position them... if that would acceptable.

Hope this helps.