Pin to Start Menu in Vista

With xp it's easy to pin items to the start menu, by simply adding a com reference to "Windows script host object model"
Pin

Code:

---

CreateObject("Shell.Application").Namespace(Environment.SystemDirectory).ParseName(fileName_Ext).InvokeVerb("P&in to Start Menu")

---

Unpin

Code:

---

CreateObject("Shell.Application").Namespace(Environment.SystemDirectory).ParseName(fileName_Ext).InvokeVerb("Unp&in from Start Menu")

---

EDIT: This example looks in the system32 folder for the file name specified as fileName_Ext.

However, this doesn't seem to work on Vista.
Does anyone know if this is possible with Vista?

oops. wrong forum? that's vb.net, but should work with some modification.

[ split thread ]

I turned up the strictness of the project, and found "late binding" errors.
I don't understand why though.
These are all objects, and they are dimensioned as objects.

How do you resolve the late binding issue with this example?

Because a system.object has no properties or methods, so if you try and calls any, then you'll get a late binding error. So, although CreateObject returns an Object, it may not have a namespace property. That's what causes the late binding error.

I can't see a solution immediately, apart from referencing shell32.dll from windows. But that would lead to cross system compatibility issues anyway!

That's what I've been thinking lately.
I've tried it several different ways, and still nothing.
I can't be sure that this is why it does'nt work on Vista, but for now it's the only reason I could come up with.

Thanks alot for the confirmation.

After some more searching, and some reworking I found a vb script works on Vista.

So the a full solution to both xp and Vista would be something like this for .NET:

Code:

---

Public Class Form1
    Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
        Dim fName As String = Process.GetCurrentProcess.ProcessName
        Dim pinned As Boolean
        pinned = PinToStartMenu(fName, True)
        If pinned = True Then
            MessageBox.Show("Pinned to start menu")
        Else
            MessageBox.Show("Not pinned to start menu")
        End If
    End Sub

    Private Sub Form1_FormClosed(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.FormClosedEventArgs) Handles Me.FormClosed
        Dim fName As String = Process.GetCurrentProcess.ProcessName
        PinToStartMenu(fName, False)
    End Sub

    Private Function PinToStartMenu(ByVal fName As String, Optional ByVal pMenu As Boolean = True) As Boolean
        On Error Resume Next
        CreateShortCut(Environment.CurrentDirectory & "\" & fName & ".exe", Environment.CurrentDirectory, fName)
        If pMenu = True Then PinToStartMenu = DoVerb(fName, "P&in to Start Menu") 'P&in
        If pMenu = False Then PinToStartMenu = DoVerb(fName, "Unp&in from Start Menu") 'Unp&in
    End Function

    Private Function CreateShortCut(ByVal filePathOrigin As String, ByVal folderPathDestination As String, ByRef linkName As String) As Boolean
        On Error Resume Next
        Dim WshShell As Object
        Dim oShellLink As Object
        WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
        oShellLink = WshShell.CreateShortCut(folderPathDestination & "\" & linkName & ".lnk")
        oShellLink.TargetPath = filePathOrigin
        oShellLink.WindowStyle = 1
        oShellLink.Hotkey = ""
        oShellLink.Description = ""
        oShellLink.WorkingDirectory = Environment.CurrentDirectory
        oShellLink.Save()
    End Function

    Private Function DoVerb(ByVal fName As String, ByVal sVerb As String) As Boolean
        Dim objShell As Object = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
        Dim objFolder As Object = objShell.Namespace(CurDir)
        If objFolder Is Nothing Then GoTo Release
        Dim objFolderItem As Object = objFolder.ParseName(fName & ".lnk")
        If objFolderItem Is Nothing Then GoTo Release
        Dim objVerb As Object
        Dim objVerbs As Object
        Dim osv As String
        osv = Environment.OSVersion.VersionString.Substring(21, 3)
        If osv = "5.0" OrElse osv = "5.1" Then
            If sVerb = "P&in to Start Menu" Then objFolderItem.InvokeVerb("P&in to Start Menu")
            If sVerb = "Unp&in from Start Menu" Then objFolderItem.InvokeVerb("Unp&in from Start Menu")
            DoVerb = True 'Did it, or at least tried to do it
        ElseIf osv.Substring(0, 1) = "6" OrElse osv.Substring(0, 1) = "7" Then
            objVerbs = objFolderItem.Verbs
            For Each objVerb In objVerbs
                If objVerb.Name = sVerb Then objVerb.doit() : DoVerb = True
            Next
        End If
Release:
        objShell = Nothing : objFolder = Nothing : objFolderItem = Nothing : objVerb = Nothing : objVerbs = Nothing
    End Function

End Class

---

You should not always pin executables directly to the start menu, because not all of them will load correctly for some unknown reason.
The solution is to make a shortcut to the executable, and then pin that file(.lnk) to the start menu.
You may want to hide the shortcuts somewhere though, in the case the user deletes the shortcut.