Show redirected folders.

Winda · Sep 23, 2007

Hello NewsGroup,

I have installed Windows XP SP2 (+ a few more updates) on three Separate
SATA II disks, as such;

[SYSTEM] C:\ - Contains Windows XP, and Programs. - 160 GB (45 GD
Partitioned for System, the rest not formatted)
[DATA] D:\ - Contains My Documents, renamed to Documents. - 320 GB
[MULTIMEDIA] M:\ Contains Music, Pictures, and Video folders. - 320 GB

A bit more specifically, I have set the folder re-direct as follows;

DATA (D

----[All Users]
----[All Users]\Documents
----[UserName]
----[UserName]\Application Data (\...With a few sub folders)
----[UserName]\Cookies
----[UserName]\Documents (\...)
----[UserName]\Favourates (\...)
----[UserName]\Local Settings (\Application Data\..., \History\...,
\Temp\..., Temporary Internet Files
----[UserName]\Recent (My Recent Documents)

MULTIMEDIA (M

----[All Users]\Music
----[All Users]\Pictures
----[All Users]\Videos
----[UserName]\Music
----[UserName]\Pictures
----[UserName]\TV
----[UserName]\Videos

Back to the subject matter. When opening Windows Explorer I typically see
the following folder tree structure;

Desktop
[+] Documents
---A few sub-folders beneith, pertaining to data folders and files.
[+] My Comptuer
[+] Floppy Drive (A

[+] SYSTEM (C

[+] DATA (D

[+] MULTUMEDIA (M

[+] DVD-RAM (W

[+] Control Panel
....., etc.

I do not get the Music, Picture, nor Video folder beneith the Documents
folder, but that is OK. I (obviously) need to expand the M: Drive to view
them. My question being, is it possible to view the Music, Picture, Video,
...., etc, folders at the same level of the Documents folders in the explorer
view, such that the folders are expandable (hence not sortcuts)? As follows;

Desktop
[+] Documents
[+] Music
[+] Pictures
[+] Videos
[+] My Comptuer
[+] Floppy Drive (A

...., etc.

I am quite familair with registry settings, not enough to accomplish the
above request to you though. Any pointers, and how to's is deeply
apprieciated, not a problem to be solved but rather a luxuary to attain.
Thanks again NewsGroup.

- Winda

Back from Vista...!

Winda · Sep 25, 2007

Solved...! After great difficulty. For anyone interested, here it is in brief,
thanks to a lot of Google links, especially a PCTools.com link, and a small app
from NirSoft;

I'll give a general Music folder redirected to a different drive to the documents
folder as an example.

In
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID] or [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID];
get a GUID, for example ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123. If you have MS
guidgen.exe you can retrieve one, or more.

Create a key
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}]
In the value of the key, set the (Default) to Music, being the name of the folder.

Under this key create the key, DefaultIcon, thus;
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\DefaultIcon]
Set the (Default) to %SystemRoot%\system32\SHELL32.dll,-237

Under the same main key create another sub-key InProcServer32.
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\InProcServer32]
Set the (Default) to shell32.dll, and create a string value, ThreadingModel, and
set this to Apartment.

Create
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\Shell
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\Shell\Open
Music]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\Shell\Open
Music\Command]
Set the (Default) to, explorer.exe /root,<driveletter>:\<MusicFolderPath>\Music

Create
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\ShellEx]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\ShellEx\PropertySheetHandlers]
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\ShellEx\PropertySheetHandlers\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}]

Create
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{ABC1DEF0-G9A8-00AB-CDEF-GFEDC0B1A123}\ShellFolder]
Create a registry binary value called Attributes, and set it to, 00 00 00 00.

A bit general, you can tweak it a bit to get more or less to what you want. Look
at the registry settings for the My Documents, and My Music special folders
Windows XP assigns these keys to, and values after installation, to specify more
attributes, also look at the %ALLUSERS% profile as well, not apparent to begin
with, but you will realise the importance of these settings when implementing
this. If you do this, take good care in doing so, and (from my perspective) it is
not that easy.

Thanks NewsGroup.

- Winda

|
| Hello NewsGroup,
|
| I have installed Windows XP SP2 (+ a few more updates) on three Separate
| SATA II disks, as such;
|
| [SYSTEM] C:\ - Contains Windows XP, and Programs. - 160 GB (45 GD
| Partitioned for System, the rest not formatted)
| [DATA] D:\ - Contains My Documents, renamed to Documents. - 320 GB
| [MULTIMEDIA] M:\ Contains Music, Pictures, and Video folders. - 320 GB
|
| A bit more specifically, I have set the folder re-direct as follows;
|
| DATA (D

| ----[All Users]
| ----[All Users]\Documents
| ----[UserName]
| ----[UserName]\Application Data (\...With a few sub folders)
| ----[UserName]\Cookies
| ----[UserName]\Documents (\...)
| ----[UserName]\Favourates (\...)
| ----[UserName]\Local Settings (\Application Data\..., \History\...,
| \Temp\..., Temporary Internet Files
| ----[UserName]\Recent (My Recent Documents)
|
| MULTIMEDIA (M

| ----[All Users]\Music
| ----[All Users]\Pictures
| ----[All Users]\Videos
| ----[UserName]\Music
| ----[UserName]\Pictures
| ----[UserName]\TV
| ----[UserName]\Videos
|
| Back to the subject matter. When opening Windows Explorer I typically see
| the following folder tree structure;
|
| Desktop
| [+] Documents
| ---A few sub-folders beneith, pertaining to data folders and files.
| [+] My Comptuer
| [+] Floppy Drive (A

| [+] SYSTEM (C

| [+] DATA (D

| [+] MULTUMEDIA (M

| [+] DVD-RAM (W