Help with Dos script to launch explorer to a url or homepage

[Phildw]

Hi guys,

 

I have a script which I run as part of a .cmd that is run to launch a specific website in internet explorer when users logon. The problem I am having is that the url has a '&' in it which dos won't parse properly. I've been trawling the net but couldn't find a solution. I then tried to set the url i wanted as the homepage for that user via AD, but then couldn't find a way to make the script launch IE just to the homepage, it seems to need to have a url passed as an argument.

 

Any help much appreciated.

 

Phil

[SovietRussia]

iexplore.exe http://URLhere

 

Sorry, miss read it! - You need to add ^ before the &

Edited September 13, 2013 by SovietRussia

[LosOjos]

Hi @Phildw - have you tried escaping the ampersand with a caret?

 

e.g:

 

Original: http://www.google.co.uk/#q=edugeek&safe=active&sout=1

Escaped: http://www.google.co.uk/#q=edugeek^&safe=active^&sout=1

[jamesreedersmith]

Could you not just put speech marks around the URL so it takes it as absolute?

[Phildw]

iexplore.exe http://URLhere

 

Sorry, miss read it! - You need to add ^ before the &

 

Hi @Phildw - have you tried escaping the ampersand with a caret?

 

e.g:

 

Original: http://www.google.co.uk/#q=edugeek&safe=active&sout=1

Escaped: http://www.google.co.uk/#q=edugeek^&safe=active^&sout=1

 

No I haven't, I'll try that, thanks

 

Could you not just put speech marks around the URL so it takes it as absolute?

 

No, this breaks it unfortunately Cheers tho

[Arthur]

You could copy-and-paste the long URL into the Google URL shortener (goo.gl).

 

[b]Before[/b]: http://www.google.co.uk/#q=edugeek&safe=active&sout=1
[b]After[/b]: http://goo.gl/AaF3rl

[Phildw]

That worked a treat, thanks guys.

 

Btw, any ideas on how to make it start up without needing an address passed to it?

[Garacesh]

Only way I could think of would be point it at a shortcut instead. But that's just adding a step where it isn't needed

[amckinley]

I had to do something very similar to this at work, and I took it in a two step approach. First I used a batch file to add the link to everyone's favorites.

 

echo [internetShortcut] >"%userprofile%\favorites\smartmoneycommunity.url"
echo URL=http://www.smartmoneycommunity.org/ >>"%userprofile%\favorites\smartmoneycommunity.url"
echo IconFile=e:\Backups\smartmoneycommunity.ico  >>"%userprofile%\favorites\smartmoneycommunity.url"
echo IconIndex=0 >>"%userprofile%\favorites\smartmoneycommunity.url"

 

After that, I simply wrote a script to launch that link, and then added it to the startup folder, so it runs as soon as the computer is turned on.

 

start %userprofile%\Favorites\smartmoneycommunity.url

 

Hope this helps!

 

Andrew

[Liam]

You can just run it as part of the shortcut. No need for a cmd

[amckinley]

very good point... in which case you could just modify the original code to save it in \startup instead of \Favorites, and save a step. We did it this way and saved it on a public network drive, then just sent everyone a link to the file and it auto installed it. Very simple.