Vulnerability Development mailing list archives
Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem?
From: nobuhiro_securityfocus () TRIALSOFTWARE COM (Nobu Hakeda)
Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 21:40:04 -0000
Hi there, I had read about this interesting(-to-me) issue in Show's Hot Corner <http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~ki4s-nkmr/>, made some research on it, and found a basic usage of 'shell:' extension. First of all, this seems to me nothing to do with IE. Rather, I guess this is a built-in functionality added to Win2K in either shell (explorer.exe) or shell extension (shell32.dll), or both. Some supporting evidences are: 1. You can enter 'shell:' in Start->Run... or 'start shell:' in command prompt, and they both work just like as being entered in IE. 2. Killing explorer.exe shell process disables the 'shell:' functionality. 3. After the extension disabled, you can enable it again by just relaunching explorer.exe as a shell. 4. Some usable combinations of 'shell:xxx' I've found are listed in shell32.dll of Win2K. If you want to double-check this, here's how you can kill your explorer.exe shell process: 1. Close all regular (folders/files-viewing) Explorers. 2. Launch Task Manager. 3. Make sure you can see only one explorer.exe in processes list. It is your 'shell' Explorer. Memorize its PID number. 4. Launch one regular Explorer. 5. Now you can see two explorer.exe in processes list in Task Manager. Kill one of explorer.exe with PID number you memorized. ...and to relaunch it again: 1. Close all regular Explorers. 2. Launch explorer.exe by File->New Task (Run...) with Task Manager. If you don't have one at this time, Press Alt-Ctrl-Del and click 'Task Manager'. Now, here is a list of 'shell:xxx' combinations I could run: (Oh BTW, I tested them on Win2K Professional 5.00.2195 with IE5 5.00.2920, both US version.) shell:Common Administrative Tools shell:Administrative Tools shell:SystemX86 shell:My Pictures shell:Profile shell:CommonProgramFiles shell:ProgramFiles shell:System shell:Windows shell:History shell:Cookies shell:Local AppData shell:AppData shell:Common Documents shell:Common Templates shell:Common AppData shell:Common Favorites shell:Common Desktop shell:Common Menu shell:Common Programs shell:Common Startup shell:Templates shell:PrintHood shell:NetHood shell:Favorites shell:Personal shell:SendTo shell:Recent shell:Menu shell:Programs shell:Startup shell:Desktop shell:Fonts shell:ConnectionsFolder shell:RecycleBinFolder shell:PrintersFolder shell:ControlPanelFolder shell:InternetFolder shell:DriveFolder shell:NetworkFolder shell:DesktopFolder All of these launch a new explorer and open a corresponding folder. It is quite self-explanatory which folder will be opened with them. I could run them both from Start->Run... and in IE. I could also run from Command Prompt, but only of those with no blanks. For example, start shell:startup worked fine in Command Prompt, but neither start shell:common startup nor start "shell:common startup" did. I could read some more texts from shell32.dll that seemed to make sense but didn't work. Those are: shell:CommonProgramFilesX86 shell:ProgramFilesX86 shell:Common AltStartup shell:AltStartup I guess they are reserved for non-x86 versions of Win2K. (Well, is Alpha version of Win2K coming?) -- Nobu Hakeda <nobuhiro () trialsoftware com> Trial Software Laboratories, Japan
Current thread:
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Blue Boar (May 31)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- Fwd: Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Aaron Kelley (Jun 01)
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Chris Hall (Jun 01)
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Alex Schuetz (Jun 02)
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Nobu Hakeda (Jun 02)
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? Stephen John (Jun 02)
- Warning! 'shell://' with win98 causes endless problems Alex Schuetz (Jun 03)
- shell:// shell:\\ shell: Cory Kantar (Jun 03)
- JOLT2.C Cory Kantar (Jun 03)
- Re: Win 2000 & IE 'shell://' problem? office (Jun 11)