Playing with Windows Registry - Part 4

From the previous articles we've got some basic knowledge about Windows Registry already. That would be enough to start doing the main things on these articles - modifying Windows by using Windows Registry. We'll start from some little basic method like modifying our Desktop and Start Menu first.

PART IV-1
Modifying Desktop and Start Menu-1

In this section we'll start to try to use the Windows Registry to modify our Desktop and Start Menu. Even though our main focus is Desktop and Start Menu, we'll also have some other things related to it, like icons, etc. Here are some good ones:

* Remember to restart your computer to see the effects.

1. Enlarging/ shrinking Desktop and Start Menu Icons
By using Windows Registry you can easily modify the size of your desktop and Start Menu Icons. Here's step by step on how to do it:
- Open Windows Registry Editor
- Go to this path: HKCU-Control Panel-Desktop-WindowMetrics
- Find the "Shell Icon Size" key
- If there isn't any, create it. (It is a STRING Value data)
- Change the value. Normally the value is 32
- To make enlarge it, raise the value
- To shrink it, decrease the value
- To make it normal again change it back to 32
- Restart your computer to see the changes

2. Displaying Windows Version on Desktop
Window Version can be normally seen from System Properties. But since we are playing with Windows Registry not System Properties, we'll try to display it on the Desktop by using Windows Registry. To do so:
- Open Windows Registry Editor
- Go to this path: HKCU-Control Panel-Desktop
- Find the "PaintDesktopVersion" key
- If there isn't any, create it. (It is a DWORD Value data)
- Change the value into 1 to activate this key
- Change it back to 0 to deactivate it
- Restart the computer
- Now you can see the Windows Version on the bottom right corner of your desktop.

3. Removing Arrow Signs in Shortcut Icons.
As we know, every single shortcut icon has an arrow sign in it. If you don't want to see that sign anymore you can easily get rid of it by using Windows Registry.
- Open Windows Registry Editor
- Go to this path: HKCR-lnkfile
- Find the "IsShortcut" key
- Rename it with whatever you want
- Go to this path: HKCR-piffile
- Find another "IsShortcut" key
- Rename it with whatever you want as well
- Restart your computer to see the effects

4. Hiding all icons in your Desktop
Desktop contains data, shortcut, and programs that can be accesses easily. We can save our time running those things from desktop. But what if the desktop icons are gone? Let's try to do it.
- Open Windows Registry Editor
- Go to this path: HKCU-Software-Microsoft-Windows-CurrentVersion-Policies-Explorer
- Create a new DWORD Value key.
- Name it "NoDesktop"
- Change the value into 1 to activate it
- Change it back to 0 to deactivate it
- Restart the computer to see the effects

* You can also log off and then re-login into your account again instead of keep restarting your computer to see the effects.

Well, for some reason this part has to be divided into two parts. So this is going to be the end of this first part.