Executable icon without rc file

[sauloqf]

Hi everyone, only as a matter of curiosity, I am trying to setup the icon of my Win32 application without using the rc file. I mean the executable icon, not the window icon. So far I tried this:

windowClass.hIcon = (HICON)LoadImage(NULL,"icon.ico",IMAGE_ICON,32,32,LR_LOADFROMFILE);
windowClass.hIconSm = (HICON)LoadImage(NULL,"icon.ico",IMAGE_ICON,16,16,LR_LOADFROMFILE);

This sets correctly the small and big window icons, but not the executable file (viewed in Windows Explorer). Anyone know how to do this?

[modoran]

Windows Explorer uses the first icon it finds to display it, so there is no way of doing this without a resource file.

[Duthomhas]

If you don't mind taking the extra (manual) step of doing it yourself:
http://www.angusj.com/resourcehacker/

[sauloqf]

Thank you all for the answers. I think this was not a good idea. Back to the rc file!