Guide: Start Menu and Taskbar

Hellbovine said:
I had to add a group policy (GPO) key to get it disabled since the other key that you mentioned gets overwritten at some point. This GPO is in the tweaks folder already though, and Windows shouldn't be resetting or ignoring GPO keys, but this is the nature of the beast sometimes. Check and see if this key got deleted:

; Taskbar > News and interests > Disabled
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Feeds]
"EnableFeeds"=dword:00000000
Click to expand...
Hey Hellbovine

Just updating, I happened to find another topic right here on the forum (https://www.ntlite.com/community/index.php?threads/news-and-interests.2230/#post-18525) where the guy managed to disable the 'news and interests' without using a group policy key just adding the value "HeadlinesOnboardingComplete", I tested it here and it really works, even for new users, I thought you would like to know since you prefer not to mess with the policies too much. :)
 
Is there an easy way to create 3 pinned icons in the "Taskbar" for Word, Excel and Powerpoint to an image?
 
You can't pin icons for apps which haven't been installed yet. Technically you could make a default layout XML, which includes pinned apps but that would probably look weird if you didn't install Office in Post-Setup, prior to your first logon.

There's different PS or VBS scripts for pinning icons, but again the target has exist first.
 
W11 layouts are very troublesome, most users end up just exporting the current layout from a working W11 system. You cannot edit the exported start.bin or start2.bin (it's a binary blob), but it can be copied to the Default User's profile folder.

Of course the catch is you need a working W11 system first. Which doesn't help everyone. There are endless complaints that the MS instructions for creating layout JSON files don't work as advertised, and you get half-baked results.
 
I Garlin thanks for the response, do you know of a guide for this, or is it just done in audit mode?
 
Logan_WFS said:
Garlin thanks for the response, do you know of a guide for this, or is it just done in audit mode?
Click to expand...
You won't need audit mode for this.
oofhours.com

Why does Windows 11 make Start menu layout so hard?

In Windows 10, you had options: You could lock down the full Start menu layout via a GPO or MDM policy, applying an XML file that sets the layout. Or, you could do a partial Start menu layout and l…
oofhours.com oofhours.com

1. Copy start2.bin (it's start.bin on W11 21H2) from your already configured user profile:
Code: 
copy %LOCALAPPDATA%\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState\start2.bin \temp_folder

2. Load your image, and explore NTLite's mounted temp folder.

3. Create the new folder path relative to the root, and copy start2.bin over:
Code: 
mkdir Users\Default\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState
copy \temp_folder\start2.bin Users\Default\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState

4. Apply changes to the image. Everyone gets the new Start Menu layout, but is allowed to make their own changes.

You might see other guides for InTune or whatever that involve scripting to copy start2.bin over. None of that is required, because you're inserting it directly into the mounted image.
 
Works like a charm. Last last questions so sorry but app associations are those possible aswell do I need to make a XML file and do some magic or is there a quick trick
 
Default app associations should be merged into “Windows\System32\OEMDefaultAssociations.xml”. Do not simply replace this file, as that will wipe out the normal file associations for other types that existed before.
 
So if i wanted to set chrome as the default browser and adobe as the default pdf view how would I go about that
 
Hi Garlin I just ended up throwing my head at it for about 30 minutes and got it to work, and the edge didn't kill it. Thanks again for all the help.
 
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