Customizing Windows Explorer in XP

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mentordas
  • Start date Start date
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Mentordas

Every time I open Windows explorer the "Folders" pane
comes up with "My Documents" open and all it's sub
folders displayed. This is inconvenient for me as I
always start in C:\. Even though I have tried every thing
to get rid of that folder, it keeps coming back like a
bad penny. I have searched the knowledge base without
much success. I am hoping there is a guru out there that
can help me with this problem. Thank You Mantordas
 
explorer [/n] [/e][,/root,object][[,/select],subobject]

None Explorer rooted at the Desktop
/n Opens a new window.
/e Explorer View (default if nothing else is on the command line.)
/root,object Starts Explorer with object the top item (normally Desktop is the top item). Eg: explorer /e,/root,c:\Starts Explorer with the C drive as the only drive available.
/select,subobject Selects the specified subobject.

Replaceable parameters are %1 (one) which is the short file or folder name and %l (L) which is the long file name.

/IDLIST
This is an additional parameter that means a Windows internal structure is being passed. eg:

Explorer.exe /e,/idlist,%I
The %I is a replacable parameter representing an IDLIST.

Rooted Views
To open an explorer item that starts with a special folder as the top folder use the following syntax.

Where the special folder is a sub folder of the desktop

explorer /e,root,::{CLSID of special folder}

Where the special folder is a sub folder of another special folder (usually, if not always My Computer)

explorer /e,root,::{CLSID of parent}/::{CLSID of special folder}

Where the special folder is part of the file system

explorer /e,root,path to folder

See Namespaces on the Icons Page for a list of CLSIDs for special folders.

Examples
Note that /select is inconsistent. Sometime the / is required, sometimes it should be left out, and sometimes it doesn't matter.

Starts explorer with the Windows folder opened and selected.

explorer /e,select,c:\windows
Starts explorer with Windows the top level folder and command opened and selected.

explorer /e,/root,c:\windows,select,c:\windows\command
Starts explorer with Windows the top level folder and Tips.txt showing instead of the file listing.

explorer /e,/root,c:\windows,select,c:\windows\tips.txt
Starts explorer with My Computer the top level folder and all branches except for drives collapsed.

explorer /e,/root,::{20d04fe0-3aea-1069-a2d8-08002b30309d}
Starts explorer with C:\ the top level folder.

explorer /e,/root,c:\
Starts the Dial Up Networking folder in folder view.

explorer.exe ::{20d04fe0-3aea-1069-a2d8-08002b30309d}\::{992cffa0-f557-101a-88ec-00dd010ccc48}
 
Right click your windows explorer shortcut and click
properties. Put this at the end of your target field:

/n,/e,C:\

your target field should look like this:

%SystemRoot%\explorer.exe /n,/e,C:\

you can replace 'C:\' with any path you would like windows
explorer to start in. I made several shortcuts to my
frequently used paths.
 
Hi. I want to thank you for your help. I did not realize
that a shortcut from one place would be different from a
shortcut from another place. Once I followed your
instructions and created a new shortcut, it worked, as I
wanted it to work. Thanks much, Mentordas
 
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