Windows start menu tiles

[Canters]

Windows 10 20H2

Office 2016

 

Hi

 

I have customised sets of Windows Start Menu tiles for my users. The actual tiles vary between user groups. The start menus are set via xml files in GPOs.

I have (had) a tile linked to the Staff User Policy that opens a link to our old Spiceworks IT Portal hosted on one of our servers. Our staff were using this as the primary method of raising an IT Support call. I need to change this, as we are now using the online version of Spiceworks. I want the tile to open an email in desktop Outlook to help@’myschool’.on.spiceworks.com

 

I’ve tried two options:

1. Change the line in the xml file. I’ve tried a number of variants of DesktopApplicationID="Microsoft.Office.OUTLOOK.EXE.16 /c ipm.note /m help@’myschool’.on.spiceworks.com" />

 

2. I also have a batch file that will open the required email. What I can’t figure out is where this batch file needs to be, and what I need to change the line in the xml file to.

a. Can it be in the staff share? I think I read somewhere that W10 20H2 doesn’t like that???

b. What do I need to type in the xml file to make it ‘see’ the batch file.

 

Can anyone see what I’m getting wrong with either option? Is there a better way I could be doing this?

 

Thanks

[bcgirton]

I'm trying to puzzle out something vaguely related, so maybe there's some synergy here.

 

I wanted to put several Edge profiles on my start menu. I did that this way:

I created several shortcuts to msedge.exe, and stored them in a separate folder directly under my username, such as C:\Users\\Edge.

I edited each shortcut's properties to point to a different profile (Edge profiles are stored in folders buried under \AppData\... named Profile 1, Profile 2, etc. I get the profile name and path from the edge://version page for that profile.)

I pinned each of these shortcuts to the start menu using the File Explorer context menu.

 

I'm thinking you should be able to create a shortcut for Outlook, edit its properties to add the relevant parameters to the command line, and pin the shortcut to the start menu. If you then open PowerShell and run export-StartLayout, the resulting XML file should contain a line with the parameter DesktopApplicationID="Microsoft.AutoGenerated.{hexcode}" that points to the shortcut. I'm not sure how you would get a shortcut pushed out to the other computers, or whether it would still work.

 

My current problem is that the tiles on the start menu apparently pull their icons only from the application file. All the tile icons for a given app are the same. I can customize the profile shortcut icons to be any .ico file, but the custom icons are only visible when the shortcut is viewed in File Explorer or the Desktop. (As an aside, I have seen attempts to trick the Taskbar into showing custom icons, and it seemed to work, but it's laborious, and I don't want to pin anything to the Taskbar anyway.) Medium sized start menu tiles based on shortcuts with custom icons show up as blank solid color tiles with the name of the shortcut in small letters at the bottom, left justified. This seems to be a Windows 10 "not-a-nice-feature."

 

The DesktopApplicationID="Microsoft.AutoGenerated.{hexcode}" parameter seems to be the key to the tile reliably accessing an app via a shortcut with custom command line parameters. The hexcode is the same one that the Powershell command Get-StartApps spews out.

 

I have not yet found any useful information that would help me solve this puzzle. If anyone knows how to work around this, so I can put distinctive Start Tiles on the Start Menu for each Edge Profile, I would appreciate the suggestion. Even a trick for changing the individual tile background color would be very helpful.

Edited October 23, 2021 by bcgirton

[Guest ZFarnworth]

This problem has been driving me crazy, we use folder redirection for startmenu with student programs and staff programs which works great when it works.

 

I’ve seen that on my new user accounts the startmenu xml file which uses the program link in the network share instead of locally.

 

In the file share there is no inheritance enabled and staff have read permissions and students have read permissions too.

 

This whole sh**t show is driving me up the wall.

 

Would appreciate anyones help

[bcgirton]

I get that Microsoft has moved beyond the simple architecture of Windows XP, but they never seem to do a complete job of anything anymore. I say to them: Fine - describe the start menu in an XML file. But at least control all aspects of the UI through one XML file, and supply a user friendly editor to allow ready and full customization. Don't quit with the first rev that meets some bare bones list of design requirements. "I'm too busy/lazy/greedy/unimaginative to do it right" is not an excuse.