How do I set my IE homepage without admin rights?

[cornflakegirl]

The IT guys at work have determined that we are all too stupid and irresponsible to be allowed to configure our computers in any way, shape or form. They are probably right. However, my internet homepage is now set to our intranet instead of Google, which is annoying. The change homepage thing in Internet Options is disabled, and clicking the "Set as homepage" link on Google doesn't work either. Anyone know a way round it?

 

[Richard Schollar]

Hi Emma

We are allowed to do diddly-squat here at work too Still, keeps us out of mischief I guess

Have you thought maybe about creating a shortcu on your desktop to

http://www.google.com

and clicking on that?

 

[Jon von der Heyden]

Further, if you add the shortcut to the Links folder then you could also configure it to display on your toolbar (no need to open favourites menu)...

On the menu bar: View > Toolbars > Links

Although you probably already know this

 

[Domski]

Hi Emma

We are allowed to do diddly-squat here at work too Still, keeps us out of mischief I guess

Have you thought maybe about creating a shortcu on your desktop to

http://www.google.com

and clicking on that?

Desktop!!! Oh to be able to create shortcuts on the desktop!!!

Took me months of talking nicely to one of the lasses from IT before she upgraded my rights and meant I can now add shortcuts to my Start Menu and change IE Explorer settings but that's about it.

 

[RoryA]

You probably don't have sufficient rights to change the registry, but try this:

Option Explicit
Const HKEY_CURRENT_USER = &H80000001
Const REG_SZ = 1
Private Declare Function RegCloseKey Lib "advapi32.dll" _
                              (ByVal hKey As Long) As Long
Private Declare Function RegOpenKey Lib "advapi32.dll" _
      Alias "RegOpenKeyA" (ByVal hKey As Long, _
      ByVal lpSubKey As String, phkResult As Long) As Long
Private Declare Function RegSetValueEx Lib "advapi32.dll" _
      Alias "RegSetValueExA" (ByVal hKey As Long, _
      ByVal lpValueName As String, ByVal Reserved As Long, _
      ByVal dwType As Long, lpData As Any, _
      ByVal cbData As Long) As Long
Sub TestSetHomePage()
   SetHomePage "http://www.google.co.uk/"
End Sub
Sub SetHomePage(strPage As String)
   Dim hKey As Long
   Dim varValue, varReturn
   Dim strValue As String
   strValue = strPage & Chr$(0)
   RegOpenKey HKEY_CURRENT_USER, _
      "Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main", hKey
   RegSetValueEx hKey, "Start page", 0&, REG_SZ, ByVal strValue, Len(strValue)
   RegCloseKey hKey
End Sub

 

[Richard Schollar]

Rory, what was that sig you had a while back about why do things manually when you can take XXX as long to do it thru code?

 

[RoryA]

My employer-before-last locked down the desktops very oddly - we all still had permissions to write to the registry if only we could figure out how, so...

 

[cornflakegirl]

Thanks guys. My desktop and the Links folder are both disabled. But thanks for the suggestions, because I wouldn't have thought of either of those!

Rory - your code is scary - but it worked! You are a genius, and I bow at your feet. Like usual!

 

[Norie]

I'm sorry but isn't this a bit like password breaking.

ie trying to circumvent security, which as far as I was aware wasn't really approved of here.

PS I realise what you want to do is pretty harmless, but perhaps the methods used to do it could pass in to the wrong hands.

 

[RoryA]

I would say not, but equally I would defer to any admin who thought it was in breach of the rules.
I did write it specifically for one purpose and removed all the additional functionality for reading values, writing other hives and value types and so on.