Anyone familiar with windows Active Setup?

Located in HKLM + HKCU\software\microsoft\active setup

From my tinkering this is where the commands are located that installs Outlook Express Icons, Addressbook icons, IE icons to the start menu etc... when a new user log's on for the first time.

I have played around with it and managed to remove the Outlook icons but cannot remove IE icons with out the system installing all the garbage links into a users favorites.... I assume I have to delete/edit the right combination of reg keys in HKLM\software\microsoft\active setup\installed components....

Well I deleted all the keys and my profile is no longer assaulted by added icons/favorites/quickbar icons etc....

Does anyone happen to know if removing all of the Active Setup commands will cause me problems later down the road?

These machines would be in a controlled environment, where most apps especially large upgrades like IE would be managed with a custom install package and tech install...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_Setup

http://bonemanblog.blogspot.com/2004/12/ac...-and-their.html

Thanks for the links, I ran across them in the research of these keys... Though I appreciate the reread, as it brought up a thought...

There are entries in this are with out stubpaths... Like .net installs, these key were missing the stubpath which actually executes commands to be run, but to have a version key

I am guessing it is not a good idea to remove items, since some apps check these version keys to make sure you have a proper version of a required component installed... Thus if all keys were deleted installation of apps may give ".net 1.1 not installed" errors...

So I guess I will test removing all stubpath keys only... see how that effects new user logins etc. I would be checking for possible configuration changes a user makes might been seen by subsequent users depending if commands in the stubpath are not reseting these configuration area's...