Quick Question (Registry Editing)

[jaguar291]

I'm running Win 98SE and I want to edit my Start menu (change the text and a couple links), what part of the registry do I need to change to get this done?

[xmaddness]

As far as links, do you mean the shortcuts on the top of the start menu, (just right click and delete, or drag and drop to it there). To edit the programs and other menus goto start----> Settings----> Tasbar and Start Menu --------> click the other tab (forget what its called off hand) in there you should be able to customize your start menu.

To change the text do you mean to make the start menu say something like "begin" instead of start?

[Pecosian]

To change the text of the say the start button, you either need a program to do it for you, someone else has done the dirty work and there's less chance of you screwing it up, or you need to hex edit your explorer.exe. I know there was an article on happyhacker.org about it. If you choose to do it on your own by hex editing the file then make backups of it. Unless you enjoy re-installing windows. As for the article at happyhacker, here it is: http://www.happyhacker.org/harmless/hex.shtml

I think some of the names like "Control Panel" are in there too, although there may be easier ways to change those. An important thing to remember is NOT to change the file size. Because it is an executable it expects certain bytes to be in certain places so if they get moved because you added one letter too many then the whole thing stops working.

[xmaddness]

Right, if you want to change the start to something else, it HAS to be some other 5 letter word or pharse, no more, no less. and make sure you back up your explorer.exe file to some other directory that is safe before you do anything to it. This way if you do end up screwing it up, you will be able to boot to dos and recover the backedup explorer. You'll need a hex editor to do this by hand.

[Unleashed]

1.Copy the \windows\explore.exe file to a new name (e.g. explorer_1.exe)
2.With the hex editor, open that file and go to offset 412b6
You will see the word start with blanks between each letter
3.Edit it be any 5 characters or less
4.Save the file
5.Boot to DOS
6.Copy the existing c:\windows\explorer.exe to explorer.org
7.Copy explorer_1.exe to explorer.exe
8.You will also need to replace the explorer.exe in the c:\windows\system32\dllcache file as well with the new one.

[lord_darkside_x]

for some reason, i recall that in win 98 there is a registry key you can change, but i do not remember which one. i am not sure that i am even correct in my memory or if there are stipulations on the length of the word and stuff.... i know you can change the "Click here to begin" in the reg. and i know y friend changed his start button to ssay "stop" (although that may have been in windows 95)

actually here is a link to a prog that does it for you http://fox.hispeed.com/quibb/start.shtml

here is a link on how to do it with your hex editor
http://www.littlewhitedog.com/reviews_other_00012.asp

[nebulus200]

As far as editing the links, just right click on your taskbar-->properties
start menu programs-->advanced

Or just edit the links under the
\windows\start menu

As far as changing the text on the buttons and stuff, I think that has already been answered pretty well.

Neb

[souleman]

I just use a program to do it. If I remember correctly, it was tweakui...

[vvirtho]

If you want to get into tweaking your Windows Registry . . . try 3D Spotlight or Axcel216 websites for information. There's tons of data and it's written so that it is easily understood. I also searched Google for "windows registry" and found additional sites that were helpful.

[Pecosian]

Here's a website with tons of things to do with your registry, from tweaking network speed to making your OS a little more secure.
http://www.winguides.com/registry/