Achdine

@Vakhal AutoIt is primarily useful for emulating keystrokes and mousepresses. You can tell it, "wait for this window to open and click the button labeled this." This is handy when you want to specify specific options in the installer that you can't do with switches/properties. However...it looks ugly. You see the program window flash open, then go through the different steps of the install process (very fast, but you see it none-the-less). Silent switches are a much better option, or if it is an MSI you can create a transform for it. AutoIt can also be used for other things; it can even be used to create a small program with a nice GUI, or change some setting in Windows you can't find a registry key for. It's fun to poke around with, but IMO ultimately the last option for installers. @Jondercik ...Don't be rude. Maybe you should "RTFM" on posting guidelines and etiquette.

As for hidng cmd.exe I use NirCMD to prevent the windows from opening at all. CMDow just hides the window after it opens, NirCMD will prevent anything from opening at all. Here are some different examples of how you can use it on your UA CD/DVD to prevent those windows from opening: Quietly execute any commandline argument: NirCMD ExeCMD "RD /S /Q "~$folder.common_start_menu$\Programs\**** NFO Viewer"" Run an application invisibly: NirCMD Exec hide "~$Nir.Exefile$\Applications\Setup.exe" /S Hide/close/move a window: NirCMD win close ititle "cmd.exe" Killing processes: NirCMD killprocess UltraMon.exe Or just turn off the monitor NirCMD Monitor Off Good stuff, and more in the excellent documentation.

Yes, there is something specific you have to do in nLite. You have to tell it to remove the OOBE! It's a checkbox under "Remove Components\Operating System Options\Out of Box Experiaence (OOBE)." Check the checkbox. Checkboxes are neat like that.

Does it do this everytime? Or have you just tested it once. Try it again and make sure it isn't just a freak incident.

Although you technically only asked one question I'm assuming you also want to remove the "Setting Up Windows XP" screens that come up just before you log in the first time. This is part of the "Out-of-Box Experience" (OOBE) and you can remove it entirely through nLite. For the "Copy To" and "Move To" context menu extensions, I have a couple of gueses. You probably used the full version of RyanVM's Windows XP Post-SP2 Update Pack. If you look at his website and scroll down to the "Other Extras Included," you'll notice that he includes those two extension as part of the package. This is not in the Medium version, which is what I prefer. That should take care of one instance. The other instance is probably in your regtweaks somewhere, especially if you just copied large blocks of code from the list on this site (tsk tsk). Look through it carefully, and only apply the tweaks that you understand and want.

@Benzal If your computer is shutting down from the cleanup script before WPI finishes, that means there is a problem with WPI.cmd. WPI.cmd should have a line that goes "Start /wait WPI.hta," which prevents WINNT.sif from moving on to the next command until WPI.hta is finished installing all your programs. If the /wait was removed, then WINNT.sif would whip through the WPI.cmd file, starting the installation process, then finish installing the BTS driverpacks, and then run your cleanup. Basically you'd have multiple programs running at the same time, and the cleanup script would interfere with the WPI script. Check and make sure that you didn't accidently remove the /wait. Increasing your shutdown time as Brandon suggested should have no effect, because that cleanup script shouldn't be running the same time as WPI anyway. It just needs to have a long enough wait to have time to delete the files in %ystemdrive%\install (which should not take very long, unless it is a LOT of files). @Vecna You can put your cleanup script in GuiRunOnce as the last command, but I prefer to have it in WPI.cmd. Just make sure it is after the "Start /wait WPI.hta" line, so that it runs after WPI installs your programs. I would also recommend running WPI.cmd last in GuiRunOnce, so that your cleanup script does not interfere with anything else you run through WINNT.sif. Also, I'm not sure what reboot.vbs, resourses.exe and restoff.reg are, it would depend on where they are mentioned in the guide. Show us where they are mentioned in the guide and someone may be able to give more info. Implementing CMDow.exe is easy enough though. Just call it at the beginning of a batch/cmd file with cmdow.exe @ /HID to hide the window, or use NirCMD (which is much better, in so many ways) when you call the batch file itself to prevent the window from opening at all.

Try adding the /F switch to "forcefully terminate the process(es)." You could also try using PsKill or NirCMD.

Resource Hackers need the file to be uncompressed in order to work their magic. The ever-popular ResHacker does not do this automatically, but the (much nicer) Resource Tuner will. Unfortunately, Resource Tuner costs money, but I believe there is a free 30 day trial. Once you are done poking around inside the file, compress it back up with UPX using the command "upx.exe --best 7zS.sfx".

I'm a very limited AutoIt user (I prefer other methods) so I can't help you with making variables, but I can tell you that it's much easier to create a shortcut that to copy it over. You can use Shortcut.exe, which is designed solely for creating shortcuts, or NirCMD, which is almost TOO sexy . NirCMD does everything, and it does it without opening cmd.exe windows. To make a shortcut with NirCMD, use something like NirCMD shortcut "%ProgramFiles%\Ahead\Nero\Nero.exe" "~$folder.common_desktop$\Programs" "Nero Burning ROM" to put a shortcut on the common desktop, or something like NirCMD shortcut "%ProgramFiles%\Ahead\Nero\Nero.exe" "~$folder.common_start_menu$\Programs" "Nero Burning ROM" to put it in the common start menu.

You could also try using Milika's ApplyTheme.exe if you don't want to use CustomDefaultThemeFile in WINNT.sif. Of course, you still need to place the files according to the guide, just call ApplyTheme...somewhere. Lots of places you can do it. If you use WPI or similar, this gives you the advantage of being able to change the themes willy-nilly or give the user the option of what theme to use. Obviously, the theme chosen with this just becomes the current theme for the current user. It doesn't apply to all users, nor does the theme become the default over Luna.

You can put the .reg import file wherever you want on your CD. The Windows install won't touch it by itself, it isn't part of its install. You need to call it yourself, whether with RunOnceEX, GUIRunOnce, CMDLines.txt, or a separate program such as WPI, XPlode or even a custom-made batch. Call it with "REGEDIT /S <path to the .reg file>". You can find more info about when/where/how to install things at the UnAttended CD/DVD Guide.

You can do save states with VMware as well, and VMware seems to run much faster and with fewer problems than Virtual PC (at least on my computer). It's also more user friendly. Highly recommended.

I'm not familiar with TuneXP or what you are trying to kill, but there are a plethora of ways to do this. You could: ~repackage/hack/recreate the installer so as to remove offensive window entirely (can be a lot of work, doesn't always work) ~make an AutoIt script that waits for the window with a certain title to open, then closes it. ~use start /wait to call the installer. This will only work if the window you want to kill was spawned by the installer, and is not the same process. ~Find/download/use a commandline tool called Wait.exe and wait a set amount of time, then use taskkill (only useful for very simple and fast installers that you can easily estimate the time you need to wait) ~use NirCMD to wait a specified time, then use it to kill the window (you can kill by process name, window title, part of a window title, handle, or even just the "top window"). This has the same restrictions as using Wait.exe, but has the advantage that it doesn't need to open a cmd.exe window of it's own (use nircmdc.exe). ... AutoIt is the all-in-one solution, but seems "overkill" to me for killing the simple things. What you should use really depends on the situation, and whether or not you're willing to look into other options.

The "Multi-Threading" option is only available if you are creating the archive on a computer that either has dual-processors or hyperthreading. Checking the option only allows 7zip to fully use the power of your processor(s) to speed up the compression. Not necessary at all, but handy when available.

%Profile% is not a Windows variable. The variable Bevone meant was %UserProfile%, which expands to something like "C:\Documents and Settings\Bevone". You can see the other variables that Windows set by opening a command window and typing "set." The rest of what he said is correct; the Start Menu is stored in the individual user profiles and in the shared profile under the Start Menu folder. Links from both places are in the Start Menu of any logged on user. You can edit anything in the Start Menu by simply adding/deleting files from these folders.

Use the modified version of Regshot 1.7, by Paraglider. It can be found here. It still produces a .txt file, but it's in registry format. Just delete what you don't need and change the extension, and it's ready to import.

This registry key should get rid of the icon on the taskbar: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets\SysTray] "Services"=dword:0000001b

@War: I was joking about it being a bug. It's not a bug, just a typo. And I don't see the point of the label for the workgroup being grayed out, when none of the other labels are.

Oh noes! Massive bug! The "Workgroup:" label is grayed out along with its' input box when you uncheck the "Edit Computer Settings" checkbox!! Looks like a nice app though, looking forward to trying it out. Great job!

Isn't this a little harsh? The person goes most of the way through the install, so their old windows is overwritten (unless they installed it elsewhere, but that's besides the point) and their computer isn't functional anymore until they can find their old windows cd or (better yet) put linux on it. Also, like dougiefresh mentioned, you need to have an operational, permanent network card installed on the machine. I personally don't feel the need to have any protection on my cd, so maybe that's why I don't sympathize with those of you who want to disable the unsuspecting person's computer. Besides, it'd be a hassle to get the MAC addresses anyway.

Try using NirCMD.exe. I've never used pskill, but NirCMD can: ~kill processes based on process name or ID. ~close windows based on handle/ID/class/title/part of the title/beginning of the title. The ability to close windows would allow you to close your explorer window without having to restart the shell, and without opening a cmd window. Just use a command like NirCMD win close title "C:\Program Files\hkSFV" You can find this 24 kb utility here.

MathType isn't a real fun installer. Check out their Administrators Manual to get more info about the switches available. I basically followed the instructions on that website for making a Workstation Install. Run a normal install on your computer, and make a self-extracting archive with WinRAR of the files it copies to the program files folder. Then copy the contents of the installer that you just ran to your install media, along with the archive you made. Then I made a simple batch file for installing the program that extracts the archive to C:\Program Files\MathType, then runs the installer: setup.exe -C -W -DL "%ProgramFiles%\MathType" Then it calls WAIT.exe (attached) with a 10 second timer to give the setup time to complete, and taskkills setup.exe. (If you don't kill the task it'll just sit at the screen asking you if you want to run the program/read the readme). I hope that makes sense :/ Good luck! WAIT.EXE