Automatic opening of applications on startup

Dear All,

I recently switched from MacOS 9 to Windows XP. In MacOS 9 I could easily
have applications open themselves automatically on startup by placing an
alias of the application in the Startup Items Folder in the System. I am
sure the same is possible in Windows XP, but I don't know my way around XP
well enough to do that.

Worse still, a search in the Windows Help facility under 'application
opening on startup', or similar, somes up with zero.

Can anyone help, please?

Many thanks,

Barry

Hi Barry,

It's similar. What you want to do is place a shortcut (.lnk) file to the
application in the startup folder. There are two, one will start the
application for all users:

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

The other will start it only for the specific user:

C:\Documents and Settings\user_name\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

To create a shortcut, there are several methods. The one I usually use is to
open Windows Explorer to that folder, then click file/new/shortcut and
browse to the executable for the program that is desired. You can also take
existing shortcut icons and simply drag and drop them into those folders, or
you can copy/paste them there.

There are other more complicated methods as well by creating registry
entries in the run keys, but for most people the above will suffice.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

"Barry O'Dwyer" wrote in message
...
Dear All,

I recently switched from MacOS 9 to Windows XP. In MacOS 9 I could easily
have applications open themselves automatically on startup by placing an
alias of the application in the Startup Items Folder in the System. I am
sure the same is possible in Windows XP, but I don't know my way around XP
well enough to do that.

Worse still, a search in the Windows Help facility under 'application
opening on startup', or similar, somes up with zero.

Can anyone help, please?

Many thanks,

Barry

Rick,

Many thanks for that. I followed your excellent instructions, and it worked
perfectly.

Barry

"Rick "Nutcase" Rogers" wrote:

Hi Barry,

It's similar. What you want to do is place a shortcut (.lnk) file to the
application in the startup folder. There are two, one will start the
application for all users:

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

The other will start it only for the specific user:

C:\Documents and Settings\user_name\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

To create a shortcut, there are several methods. The one I usually use is to
open Windows Explorer to that folder, then click file/new/shortcut and
browse to the executable for the program that is desired. You can also take
existing shortcut icons and simply drag and drop them into those folders, or
you can copy/paste them there.

There are other more complicated methods as well by creating registry
entries in the run keys, but for most people the above will suffice.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

"Barry O'Dwyer" wrote in message
...
Dear All,

I recently switched from MacOS 9 to Windows XP. In MacOS 9 I could easily
have applications open themselves automatically on startup by placing an
alias of the application in the Startup Items Folder in the System. I am
sure the same is possible in Windows XP, but I don't know my way around XP
well enough to do that.

Worse still, a search in the Windows Help facility under 'application
opening on startup', or similar, somes up with zero.

Can anyone help, please?

Many thanks,

Barry