WinKey Registry Settings

[Eonic]

Hello,

First off just let me say that this is an amazing forum which has up until now helped me tremenduously with my unattended dvd. Appreciate that a lot.

I'm sorry if this has been brought up before, but I have been reading for a while here now and I have not seen it. I would like to know what registry key/value I can edit to change the actions of the WinKey keyboard shortcuts. I.e. make "WinKey + E" start something besides Windows Explorer. I know there are applications out there that will solve this for me, but I like to do things like these manually. I'll still try and find it myself in the registry, but if someone already has and could tell me that would be excellent and you have my thanks.

[Zxian]

Hi there,

I don't think that these settings are actually set in the registry. As far as I know, they're hard coded into explorer.exe. If you want to go digging hard enough, you can open up explorer.exe in ResHacker and look at the Accelerator Table. I'm not sure what values will give you what though...

Oh, and welcome!

[Eonic]

Thank you for the reply and welcome.

I should have tried this earlier, after reading your post I killed the explorer.exe process and tried to use the WinKey shortcuts.. they didn't work anylonger. I might try and hack around a bit in explorer.exe then. *sigh*. I had hoped it was in the registry.

EDIT: Well, isn't there a chance that it still could be settings in the registry? but that explorer.exe has to be running to execute them? hmm..

[DigeratiPrime]

You can run shortcuts using hotkeys, this will let you run applications and open folders.

Just create a shortcut to something, right click>properties>shortcut tab>shortcut key.

Also look at this, its a free/open source app that just got updated yesterday infact

http://www.autohotkey.com/

AutoHotkey is a free, open-source utility for Windows. With it, you can:

    * Automate almost anything by sending keystrokes and mouse clicks. You can write a mouse or keyboard macro by hand or use the macro recorder.

    * Create hotkeys for keyboard, joystick, and mouse. Virtually any key, button, or combination can become a hotkey.

    * Expand abbreviations as you type them. For example, typing "btw" can automatically produce "by the way".

    * Create custom data entry forms, user interfaces, and menu bars. See GUI for details.

    * Remap keys and buttons on your keyboard, joystick, and mouse.

    * Run existing AutoIt v2 scripts and enhance them with new capabilities.

    * Convert any script into an EXE file that can be run on computers that don't have AutoHotkey installed.

[EDIT] In fact this is so good im putting it in my sig.

[Eonic]

Thanks for your reply.

The only problem with using keyboard-shortcuts with application shortcuts is that they will not accept the WinKey. I wanted to use the WinKey as it will not collide with other applications possible "alt" or "ctrl" shortcuts, and is physically a very convenient key to use for key-combinations. I will definately take a look at AutoHotKey though.

As a side note, I'm a huge fan of open source.