Groups > alt.comp.os.windows-10 > #186885

Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser

From	"R.Wieser" <address@is.invalid>
Newsgroups	alt.comp.os.windows-10, alt.comp.os.windows-11, alt.comp.microsoft.windows
Subject	Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser
Date	2025-08-19 19:47 +0200
Organization	A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID	<1082dcc$3sbh6$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References	<10825ir$7nu$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>

Cross-posted to 3 groups.

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Arlen,

Tutorials are a bit more than just installation instructions.

Next to a summing-up of all the up sides of a certain approach, they 
normally also contain a listing of the down sides of it - so the user can 
make an informed choice.

In your case, changing the default browser will change the target of certain 
file-extensions.  In your case /at least/ the .htm and .html ones.

...Meaning that just double-clicking an html file will not work anymore 
(gets caught by your dummy browser).  :-((

And it gets even worse when someone hand-edited some of those registry 
entries and now has to discover that those got overwritten. :-|


> [Tested only once. By me. Today. On Windows 10. For privacy.]

A way for the user to test if everything was done/entered correctly would 
also be considered part of a tutorial (like how to get the default browser 
started).  Now all the user can do is wait and hope. :-(


> Since Windows won't set the default web browser to a batch file,

A question : how do you think the default web-browser picker knows what to 
check that "DummyBrowser.exe" name against ?   I do not, in the 
"StartMenuInternet" registry branch, see any filepath to the executable 
itself.


The *only* place your .REG file shows a name with a .EXE extension is here :

> [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\DummyBrowserHTML\shell\open\command]
> @="\"C:\\path\\to\\dummybrowser.exe\" \"%1\""

And what-do-you-know, I could, under my OS, have it point to a batch file 
and see it run when I double-click an html file.


Bottom line : you're too focussed on the "everything works" result, and 
little eye for "what happens if it doesn't" or "can it be done simpler" and, 
rather important, "what are the drawbacks".

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

Thread

Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser Marion <marion@facts.com> - 2025-08-19 15:34 +0000
  Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser "R.Wieser" <address@is.invalid> - 2025-08-19 19:47 +0200
    Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser Marion <marion@facts.com> - 2025-08-19 21:07 +0000
      Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser "R.Wieser" <address@is.invalid> - 2025-08-20 09:09 +0200
        Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser Marion <marion@facts.com> - 2025-08-21 03:33 +0000
          Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser "R.Wieser" <address@is.invalid> - 2025-08-21 09:49 +0200
      Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser wasbit <wasbit@REMOVEhotmail.com> - 2025-08-20 10:08 +0100
        Re: Tutorial: How to set up any batch script as your Windows default web browser Marion <marion@facts.com> - 2025-08-20 16:32 +0000

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