In Reader to Reader: "Various Services Won't Start" (February 2003, http://www.winnetmag .com, InstantDoc ID 27559), Peter Wong had a problem with Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2000 services failing to start. Peter enclosed the ImagePath value in quotes in the registry to fix the problem. He thought the problem occurred because long filename support had been disabled in the HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem registry subkey's Win31File-System parameter.
However, the Win31FileSystem value affects only future long filename creation on FAT volumes (not NTFS). If the value is 1, long filename creation will fail but you can use existing long filename entries. If the value is 0 and long filename entries for a folder or file don't already exist, long filenames won't be created for new files. If all the volumes are NTFS, the Win31FileSystem value is irrelevant.
So, if the Win31FileSystem value had caused Peter's problem, enclosing the ImagePath value in quotes would have produced no results. The problem actually relates to the fact that some ImagePath values specified in the registry for certain services contain spaces in the pathname. If the pathname contains a space (e.g., C:\program files\windows nt\accessories\wordpad.exe), the system expects a parameter when the service starts. In my example, the system would consider C:\program a program and try to pass files\windows nt\accessories\wordpad.exe as a set of parameters.
Enclosing the path in quotes eliminates this problem. To see for yourself, try opening a command prompt in Windows XP, Windows 2000, or Windows NT and entering
first without quotes, then with quotes.