scriptedlogon

hi everyone,

This topic is not really about a MediaPortal plugin but a small utility I use on my dedicated HTPC, namely scriptedlogon.
http://www.team-mediaportal.com/file...ScriptedLogon/

In a nutshell, it is a small scripting program that can be used i.e. to run MediaPortal and several miscellaneous programs at Windows user logon time, w/out the need to load the explorer.exe process (rather useless in the context of a dedicated HTPC configuration). The MediaPortal integration into Windows environment is, in a way, much "nicer".

It's been available for quite a long time now but I still don't know if I'm the only one to use it on an everyday basis. Regarding the number of downloads it seems that a few people do have a use for it, but I don't know if and how they really use it. And most of all, do they find it useful in its current shape.
Its development is halted because I don't feel the need to improve it any further (it fullfills all my needs ATM).
However I created this topic in order to gather the potential feedback and perhaps some bug reports and feature requests from the few persons that use it.

cheers

[Spragleknas]

What are the benefits of using this app.? lover CPU/MEM-usage? Less errors/conflicts?

Gonna give it a try next week.

[mPod]

Note that running MP as shell can lead to unexpected behaviour, we had some weird user reports in the past.

So if you see anything bad, please disable this script, run XP normally and check if the error is gone. The team cannot support running MP as shell, sorry. It is not designed for this purpose.

[Efros]

I used it quite successfully to start MP as a shell under TinyXP and also to kick start the firefly drivers. Only issue I had was not related to the use of MP as a shell or scripted Logon but more to the stripped out nature of TinyXP

[mPod]

Read twice.

It CAN, it doesn't have to... The above is just a note that such a configuration is not supported by Team MediaPortal. Nothing else.

(Stripped down XPs are not either, btw...)

yes, of course. This manipulation is not endorsed in anyway by the MP team. Some people had strange DirectX issues when getting rid of explorer.exe while others enjoyed a rock-stable system. A matter of luck or karma maybe. It is however not really dangerous (unlike using MinLogon).

If you want to try this manipulation, it is really advised to have more than one Windows account. If something really bad happens, then you'll be able to use the other user account to easily replace the original explorer.exe entry in the registry.

In a word, this app could be entirely replaced by the use of DOS batch files, no voodoo magic herein.

If you want to use scriptedlogon in order to replace explorer.exe then it's rather a matter of getting rid of any visible trace of Windows when you run MediaPortal. Much alike a standalone DVD player, when you power it on you don't want to know which microOS it runs and go straight to your DVD content without any external manipulation. With this wiki page http://wiki.team-mediaportal.com/Use...HTPC_looknfeel you can easily achieve this, but it is at your own risks.
I use it as well to produce maintenance scripts run by the Windows Scheduler (EPG updates, system integrity checks, removal of old files, etc).

[Efros]

I used to have two registry keys saved in my root directory which switched between shells, one for MP shell and the other for explorer, if i needed to do some housekeeping I loaded the explorer reg key and rebooted. mpod, I was just relating my experience with mp as shell, not recommending it, suffice it to say I don't use it now, I did use the term "used to".

[sebrock]

Can't have that karma you talk about then. At first everything worked great with scriptedlogon. Now everything works great except when shutting the box down. It stalls after closing MP. All I see is what is left of the desktop (ie only background). Any idea what this is? Any logs I can check out? As I said, MP shuts down, just not windows???

[reagan+carter]

hello,
what has changed since last it worked? please re-run scriptedlogon in DEBUG level and attach a log along with your script.

[armyofme]

Hi there, I want to try scriptedlogon and have looked around for help but can't find any. I'm sure I'm being stupid but I read the text file that comes with it and can't make out what this means:

"If you want to replace current shell with this proggie then:
-In the registry, change HKEY_Current_User\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Shell value with the program name and path and associated file to parse"

What does the bit in bold mean? Can someone give me an example of how this would be written? I guess it would start "C:\program files\team mediaportal\mediaportal\scriptedlogon.exe" but how do I add the other bit to this?

Hope this makes sense and someone can help.

Many thanks.