GUIDS of a Control Panel applets (Vista)

Today I’ll show how to create a special shortcut to the Control Panel applets, of course everything concerning the Windows Vista. You can also use that policy in the Windows XP, but not every object (applet), which I described here exists in XP (GUIDS are the same in both systems).

GUID - Globally Unique Identifier is a 128bit (16bytes) number that specify an object (ex. shell folder) in the Windows systems.

Lets take a look at the list below.

Each applet is represented by one unique number (GUID). Now, I’ll show you how to create a special shortcut with using that numbers.

We will put our shortcut on a Desktop. Run a regedit, and open following key (pic1):

HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\Desktop\NameSpace

Pic.1

Inside this key create new key with a name {ED834ED6-4B5A-4bfe-8F11-A626DCB6A921} (pic2)

Pic.2

Now refresh the Desktop, you will see a new icon - Personalization

If you want to remove new shortcut from the dekstop, just delete
{ED834ED6-4B5A-4bfe-8F11-A626DCB6A921} key.

You can also add the shortcuts to the others special places (HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\..):

• Control Panel - ControPanel\NameSpace
• Desktop - Desktop\NameSpace
• MyComputer - MyComputer\NameSpace

I only presented the GUIDs of the Control Panel applets. In the near future, I will show you the numbers of the others shell objects.

No Comments »

Vista (User) Shell Folders - Registry (part 2)

Now let’s see current user profile paths.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\…\Shell Folders

- Windows XP -

AN - AccountName

- Windows Vista -

AN - AccountName

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\…\User Shell Folders

%USERPROFILE% - the environment variable - C:\Documents And Settings\AN

- Windows XP -

%USERPROFILE% - the environment variable - C:\Users\AN

- Windows Vista -

Both, Windows Vista and Xp stores the current user profile in one directory (XP - C:\Documents and Settings\AccountName, Vista - C:\Users\AccountName), but in Vista the major role plays C:\Users\AccountName\AppData folder with \Roaming and \Local subfolders. The C:\User\AccountName\AppData is equivalent of the C:\Documents and Settings\AccountName\Application Data

We can also find the difference deep inside the profile folders nodes, but the main directories in the Windows Vista are:

• C:\Users,
• C:\Users\Public,
• C:\Users\AppData (\Roaming, and \Local),
• C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows.

No Comments »

Vista (User) Shell Folders - Registry (part 1)

Yesterday I showed you the structure of windows vista profiles folders. As you know, a lot of changes ensued in new OS. The folder names was simplified, some places doesn’t exist anymore, and an old names referring to a new objects. Today we will compare a registry values, which contains a paths to suitable profile folders.

User Shell Folders - This subkey contains the path to Windows Explorer folders for current users and for all users. The entries that appear in user User Shell Folders take precedence over those in Shell Folders.

Shell Folders - The subkey remains in the registry to support programs designed for Windows NT 4.0 or earlier.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\…\Shell Folders

- Windows XP -

- Windows Vista -

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\…\User Shell Folders

%ALLUSERSPROFILE% - the environment variable - C:\Documents and Settings\All Users

- Windows XP -

%PUBLIC% - the environment variable - C:\Users\Public

%ProgramData% - the environment variable - C:\ProgramData

- Windows Vista -

Analyzing those four tables we can see the difference between profiles folders. Windows Xp have only one folder to store
the all users profile files - C:\Documents And Folders\All Users , however Vista have two folders - C:\Users\Public and C:\ProgramData\Microsoft (the rest of folders in C:\ProgramData are links (JUNCTIONS) to C:\Users\Public and C:\ProgramData\Microsoft).

End of Part 1

No Comments »