HOWTO: Create Shortcuts (Shell Links) within Windows

ID: Q155303

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Visual Basic Control Creation, Learning, Professional, and Enterprise Editions for Windows, version 5.0
Microsoft Visual Basic Standard, Professional, and Enterprise Editions, 32-bit only, for Windows, version 4.0

SUMMARY

Sometimes it is necessary to create shortcuts to your applications or documents somewhere on another user's system. Do this by calling the fCreateShellLink API function found in the Stkit432.dll file that ships with the Setup ToolKit in Microsoft Visual Basic version 4.0 for Windows or the Vb5stkit.dll file that ships with the Setup Toolkit in Visual Basic 5.0. The steps that follow show you how to do this.

MORE INFORMATION

Shell links, also known as shortcuts, are a convenient way to reference objects within the shell name space (the hierarchical structure of objects in the Microsoft Windows 95 and Windows 98 shell) without having to keep track of the name and location of the original object. Shell links are referred to as shortcuts in the Context menu (that appears when you right- click an object) of shell objects. They are implemented internally through the IShellLink interface.

Steps for Creating a Shell Link (Shortcut) to the Desktop

Start a new project in Visual Basic. Form1 is created by default.

Add a Command button (Command1) to Form1.

Add the following code to the General Declarations section of Form1:


      Option Explicit

      'NOTE: In Visual Basic 5.0, change Stkit432.dll in the following
      'statement to Vb5stkit.dll. In Visual Basic 6.0, change it to
      'Vb6stkit.dll.

      Private Declare Function fCreateShellLink Lib "STKIT432.DLL" (ByVal _
       lpstrFolderName As String, ByVal lpstrLinkName As String, ByVal _
       lpstrLinkPath As String, ByVal lpstrLinkArgs As String) As Long

      Sub Command1_Click()

        Dim lReturn As Long

        'Add to Desktop
        lReturn = fCreateShellLink("..\..\Desktop", _
        "Shortcut to Calculator", "c:\Winnt\system32\calc.exe", "")

        'Add to Program Menu Group
        lReturn = fCreateShellLink("", "Shortcut to Calculator", _
        "c:\Winnt\system32\calc.exe", "")

        'Add to Startup Group

        'Note that on Windows NT, the shortcut will not actually appear
        'in the Startup group until your next reboot.
        lReturn = fCreateShellLink("\Startup", "Shortcut to Calculator", _
        "c:\Winnt\system32\calc.exe", "")

      End Sub

Press the F5 key to run the project, and then click the Command button.

NOTE: If you are running Windows NT, the above example works correctly. If you are running Windows 95 or Windows 98, change the Calc.exe path to the following:


   C:\Windows\Calc.exe

This creates a shortcut to the Calc.exe file on the user's desktop, a program group, and a reference to it in the Startup items.

REFERENCES

Please refer to the sample on the Visual Basic 5.0 and later CD-ROM: Tools\Unsupprt\ShellLnk

In the Visual Studio CD-ROM: \common\Tools\vb\Unsupprt\ShellLnk

For additional information, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q140443 How To Create a Shortcut on the Desktop

Additional query words:

Keywords : kbsetup kbVBp kbVBp400 kbVBp500 kbVBp600
Version : WINDOWS:4.0,5.0
Platform : WINDOWS
Issue type : kbhowto