Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Windows 7 Start Menu Tips

I'm finally using Windows 7.  I like Windows 7, it's Office 2007 that's hard to get used to.  To me, performance-wise it seems clunkier than Office 2003.


Here are some things about Windows 7 that I have a hard time remembering, so I'm putting them here:


Location of your user-specific Start Menu items:
%APPDATA%MicrosoftWindowsStart MenuPrograms


Location of Start Menu items for all users:
C:ProgramDataMicrosoftWindowsStart MenuPrograms
(C:ProgramData is the same as %ALLUSERSPROFILE% on my computer)


How to add shortcuts as pinned items to the Start Menu:
Create a blank text file on your desktop.  Rename it with an .exe extension.  Right click on it and choose "Pin to Start Menu."  Go to pinned items on Start Menu and right click on your newly pinned item, choose "Properties," and you can now edit the path to any executable you want, with arguments, etc. (even to locations on networked drives).
Additional tip: assign it a shortcut key combination and you can open it from the keyboard at any time!