Use this item to ask questions about or enter into dicsuccions about
Microsoft Windows 95 or 98.

16 responses total.

I have Windows 98.  I detest the Windows 95+ "desktop icon / Start menu"
interface.  I still like and use Program Manager (progman.exe), even on my
Win2K PC at work.  On my Win98 machine I have more than one profile.  I would
like each profile to have a different "view" for progman.  But it seems that
it will only honor the progman.ini file in the \windows directory.  I tried
a variety of things, to no avail.  I was not able to find any documentation
on if & how it's possible to use progman with different "views".  I may be
reduced to trying to hack a separate instance of the progman.exe file with
a filename different than progman.ini

Does anyone have any ideas about if & how I could do what I'm trying to do?

Maybe start different sessions with a batch file so that you can automatically
switch around which file is name "progman.ini".

I.e.:
rem Run progman with prog1.ini
copy prog1.ini progman.ini
call progman.exe

Yes, on rethinking things more clearly, you're right, it's possible to do
that, since starting with Win95, running a Windows program from a command
shell allowed it to start up independently from the shell, instead of the
shell displaying the dreaded "this program requires MS windows" message.
The only thing to ensure is that with an exit statement the batch file will
exit automatically without requiring a manual window close.

Of course, the problem is:  Can the batch file determine which profile is
active?  At first glance, there doesn't seem to be any environmentment
variable with that value in it.  Also, even though there are different
profiles, unlike NT (or at least Win2K), there appears to be a common startup
folder ("group") that all profiles use.

Well, if you always start from a batch file then you can have that batch file
set a variable or a file so that a later run of the batch file can check it.

I was wrong about something, and I'm glad I was:  Each Win98 profile does
indeed have its own version of the Startup group.  So I have placed a custom
version of a "start program manager" batch file in each profile's Startup
group, which copies the profile's custom version of the progman.ini file to
the c:\windows directory, and I now have the effect I wanted.  It's a bit
hokey, but it does the job.  To get a batch file window to close automatically
when the batch file executes an exit statement, you just need to check the
"close window on exit" box on the Program tab of the properties window for
the shortcut used to run the batch file.

Here's the scenario.  A friend of mine has a small business with a
couple employees.  They have a PC running Win98 for various office
work.  They have an Internet account, but it's only occasionally used --
in fact, my friend doesn't want employees wasting time using it, so only
she knows the password.

The problem is some employees are taking advantage of the fact that the
machine has a modem, and dialing into their *own* internet accounts with
it.  Not only is this a productivity problem, it ties up the business'
only phone line.

Here's the question.  Is it possible, in Win98, to restrict access to
Dial Up Networking to only one user?  My friend is asking me for help,
and I'm not sure how to go about it.

Well, since "some" out of "a couple" probably means just one or two people,
I'd advise cornering the culprit(s) instead of some technical fix.

One thing to try would be a "phone in use" light (a *big* one) on top of the
monitor.  You can get kits for this for about $10, I think.  

The problem is she's not always around to observe what's going on, so
adding a light won't really help.  There's really only one culprit, but
she'd like a situation that doesn't involve firing him.

It seems to me this is a fairly basic security item that Windows ought
to be able to do without much fuss, but I can't figure out how I'd
accomplish it.

Maybe two different accounts with different hardware profiles?  I've never
played with that, but it should be possible to set up one with the modem
disabled.

If she knows who it is, why not discuss it?  How would she deal with an
employee making excessive personal phone calls?

I think she has discussed it with him.  I think she's just looking for a way
to limit the temptation, to help make sure it won't come up again.  We're
talking about a high-school-age employee here, his brain hasn't fully
developed. ;>

Didn't think of changing the hardware profiles; I wasn't aware those could
be done by account.  I'll look into that.  I was also considering setting up
different user profiles, one of which had none of the Internet software in
the Start menu.

Yes, "hiding" the software is one low-tech way to go:  Make sure there are
no shortcuts etc. easily available.  That doesn't top the lad/lassy from using
Explorer or Start|Run to invoke the software explicitly.  But then everyone
would know that the user deliberately went to special steps to do something
he/she knew he/she wasn't supposed to.

Hey, maybe a batch file to hide/unhide some critical .dll for the dial-up
networking?  All you'd have to do is move or rename it, and make the batch
file(s) obscure enough.

Re #13:

Hmm.  Interesting thought.  Thanks.

Make sure it's not critical for anything else that's *supposed* to be running,
though.

Right.  I have to poke around, but it seems like there's a DLL that's
exclusively used by Dial Up Networking (and software that launches its
own dialer, like IE.)

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