Attaching a shortcut to an email

[Jeff Layman]

Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.

--

Jeff

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Can you explain why you want to email a shortcut to a program on your
computer to someone else? What value would it be to your recipient?

--
-bts
-This space for rent, but the price is high

[Paul S Wolf]

On 11/22/2011 12:36 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.

Why bother? The shortcut would point to the *.exe file on YOUR hard
drive, and would probably be useless to anyone else.

Besides, Most people would consider it as a possible pointer to malware
and wouldn't click it anyway. I know I sure wouldn't

--
Paul S. Wolf, PE, FITE mailto:paul....@alum.wpi.edu
Fellow, Institute of Transportation Engineers

[gla...@linuxuser.iam]

On 11/22/2011 05:36 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.

everyone has their reason for doing something. ;)

select "Write" icon, or <ctrl+n> to open compose window.


in compose window, click "Attach" icon, or, <alt+f>,<t>,<f>.

in "Attach" window, change directories to "Desktop" directory, select
shortcut file.


if that is what you tried, next may or may not work.

+++
open file browser in details mode. change directory to desktop directory.
locate file for shortcut, hilite file name, right click, select edit,
use plain text editor.

in editor, press <ctrl+a>,<ctrl+c> to copy.

in body of compose window, press <ctrl+v> to write text.

instruct email recipient to hilite section of email with text from shortcut,
press <ctrl+c> to copy text to buffer.

next have recipient open a file browser and open their desktop directory,
right click in directory, select create file, paste buffer, <ctrl+v>.
save file with name of shortcut.
+++


hth.
--
peace out.

tc, hago.

walking the walk. long live tux.

g
.

*please reply "plain text" only. "html text" are deleted*

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 18:09, Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:
> Jeff Layman wrote:
>
>> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
>> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached
>> instead.
>
> Can you explain why you want to email a shortcut to a program on your
> computer to someone else? What value would it be to your recipient?
>

Dropping the shortcut into a Win7 Start menu substitute resulted in that
utility crashing. It would not work (even after an uninstall/reinstall)
until the offending shortcut was removed (I had to remove it from the
default start menu). Then it worked perfectly. I wanted to sent the
shortcut to the utility developer to see if he could work out why it
crashed the program.

--

Jeff

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 18:11, Paul S Wolf wrote:
> On 11/22/2011 12:36 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
>> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
>> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.
>
> Why bother? The shortcut would point to the *.exe file on YOUR hard
> drive, and would probably be useless to anyone else.
>
> Besides, Most people would consider it as a possible pointer to malware
> and wouldn't click it anyway. I know I sure wouldn't

See my reply to Beauregard...

--

Jeff

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Ah, I see. Those extra details would have eliminated the rest of us
asking questions about "why", which made no sense.

What happens when you create the shortcut in the menu manually, instead
of "dropping" it there? Maybe you're trying to access a system or a
hidden directory/file.

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 18:16, gla...@linuxuser.iam wrote:
> On 11/22/2011 05:36 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
>> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
>> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.
>
> everyone has their reason for doing something. ;)
>
> select "Write" icon, or<ctrl+n> to open compose window.
>
>
> in compose window, click "Attach" icon, or,<alt+f>,<t>,<f>.
>
> in "Attach" window, change directories to "Desktop" directory, select
> shortcut file.
>
>
> if that is what you tried, next may or may not work.

That's what results in the *.exe getting attached, rather than the
shortcut file pointing to it.

> +++
> open file browser in details mode. change directory to desktop directory.
> locate file for shortcut, hilite file name, right click, select edit,
> use plain text editor.
>

There is no "edit" on the Win7 Explorer right-click menu. I had
previously tried your idea by sending the highlighted shortcut file to
Notepad. That works, but...

> in editor, press<ctrl+a>,<ctrl+c> to copy.
>
> in body of compose window, press<ctrl+v> to write text.
>
> instruct email recipient to hilite section of email with text from shortcut,
> press<ctrl+c> to copy text to buffer.
>
> next have recipient open a file browser and open their desktop directory,
> right click in directory, select create file, paste buffer,<ctrl+v>.
> save file with name of shortcut.

... I tried this myself with a "Test" folder, but there is no
right-click "Create file" option to paste anything to.

It might be possible to open the shortcut in a hex editor, and save that
as a file to send. Opening that sent file in another hex editor may
allow a file to be created, which might be identical to the original
shortcut. I don't have any experience of hex editors so don't know
whether or not this is possible.

Thanks for trying anyway.

--

Jeff

[gla...@linuxuser.iam]

On 11/22/2011 06:41 PM, Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:
<>

> Ah, I see. Those extra details would have eliminated the rest of us
> asking questions about "why", which made no sense.

speak for yourself and mouse in your pocket. 8-D

[gla...@linuxuser.iam]

On 11/22/2011 06:47 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
<>


> Thanks for trying anyway.

not thru yet. ;-)


your mention of hex file kicked my recall. iirc, and things have not changed
drastically in win7, hex file has pointers.

also, iirc, there is another directory with more info related to shortcut.
it is too long from last time i 'played' with ms file system and i do not
have any ms systems installed or available to check.

you can open file in a hex editor and scroll thru file and see the pointers.

therefore, copy file to another file with a different extent name, such as
'.hex'.

possibly, there will be another reader of your post who is knowledged of
what ms is now doing and can give you instructions of what to do.

or, which may be best solution, write back to who you are going to send
file/s to and ask them what you need to do to send them the file/s.

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 19:09, gla...@linuxuser.iam wrote:
> On 11/22/2011 06:47 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> <>
>
>
>> Thanks for trying anyway.
>
> not thru yet. ;-)
>
>
> your mention of hex file kicked my recall. iirc, and things have not changed
> drastically in win7, hex file has pointers.
>
> also, iirc, there is another directory with more info related to shortcut.
> it is too long from last time i 'played' with ms file system and i do not
> have any ms systems installed or available to check.
>
> you can open file in a hex editor and scroll thru file and see the pointers.
>
> therefore, copy file to another file with a different extent name, such as
> '.hex'.
>
> possibly, there will be another reader of your post who is knowledged of
> what ms is now doing and can give you instructions of what to do.
>
> or, which may be best solution, write back to who you are going to send
> file/s to and ask them what you need to do to send them the file/s.
>

.
I downloaded a hex editor, "opened" the shortcut in it, and without any
change saved the open file. I was very suspicious when I saw the saved
file was the same size as the *.exe file the shortcut pointed to!

It appears that the shortcut "files" behave very specifically. This is
from the Wikipedia article on symbolic links
(https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Symbolic_link):

"Shortcuts, which are supported by the graphical file browsers of some
operating systems, may resemble symbolic links but differ in a number of
important ways. One difference is what type of software is able to
follow them:

* Symbolic links are automatically resolved by the file system. Any
software program, upon accessing a symbolic link, will see the target
instead, whether the program is aware of symbolic links or not.

* Shortcuts are treated like ordinary files by the file system and by
software programs that are not aware of them. Only software programs
that understand shortcuts (such as the Windows shell and file browsers)
treat them as references to other files."

It is most certainly possible to "open" a shortcut in a text editor such
as notepad, but it doesn't seem possible to do it in a hex editor, as
that sees the target instead.

--

Jeff

[Jeff Layman]

I got back to the developer who informed me that the way I had tried to
get the shortcut there (copy and paste into "Programs") was not correct.
Simply dragging it over the start button, waiting for the programs
menu to expand, and dropping it where I wanted in the list was what was
needed. I've just tried it and everything is works well. I can't see
why that is different from what I tried - isn't copy and paste
effectively the same as drag and drop?

But it still hasn't answered the point of how you can sent a shortcut to
someone (however daft that might sound) if it is needed to resolve a
problem.

--

Jeff

[Jay Garcia]

On 22.11.2011 13:43, Jeff Layman wrote:

--- Original Message ---

> But it still hasn't answered the point of how you can sent a shortcut to
> someone (however daft that might sound) if it is needed to resolve a
> problem.
>

If I am reading this correctly (probably not) you want to send a "file"
by attaching it? You can't do that from a shortcut. A shortcut is a .lnk
file that only points to the file located on YOUR drive, not the
recipient's system. If you want to send a file to a recipient then you
attach the file itself, not a shortcut.

--
Jay Garcia - www.ufaq.org - Netscape - Firefox - SeaMonkey - Thunderbird
Mozilla Contribute Coordinator Team - www.mozilla.org/contribute/
Mozilla Mozillian Member - www.mozillians.org
Mozilla Contributor Member - www.mozilla.org/credits/

[clay]

On 11/22/2011 11:43 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> On 22/11/2011 18:41, Beauregard T. Shagnasty wrote:
>> Jeff Layman wrote:

>>...

>
> I got back to the developer who informed me that the way I had tried to
> get the shortcut there (copy and paste into "Programs") was not correct.
> Simply dragging it over the start button, waiting for the programs menu
> to expand, and dropping it where I wanted in the list was what was
> needed. I've just tried it and everything is works well. I can't see why
> that is different from what I tried - isn't copy and paste effectively
> the same as drag and drop?
>
> But it still hasn't answered the point of how you can sent a shortcut to
> someone (however daft that might sound) if it is needed to resolve a
> problem.
>

A shortcut is simply a file.lnk* with a/path/to/somefile.exe in it.
Opening it with a text editor would reveal this.
In the old days, Properties showed the path and would 'Find' the target.

Windows has done a grand job of obscuring all this for the user so
getting useful information out of a W7 box is beyond my expertise.

(*Even with the suicidal default "Hide extensions of known file types"
unchecked, Windows still hides extensions from us. For example: .lnk,
.shs, .pif are all still hidden. Add any of these to the end of a name
and watch the extension disappear.
Search NeverShowExt in the registry to see all that are still hidden...)

[gla...@linuxuser.iam]

On 11/22/2011 07:30 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
<>


> It is most certainly possible to "open" a shortcut in a text editor such
> as notepad, but it doesn't seem possible to do it in a hex editor, as
> that sees the target instead.

if shortcut is a true link, then therein lies a problem.

this is where i would need to have an ms install, or access to one.

as i have mentioned, iirc, there is/was another directory with information
related to actual .exe file.

after reading your supplied url for 'symbolic link' i decided to see
what was said about 'shortcut' and it is more as i recall;

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File_shortcut

so, from above, do you have a .lnk file with name of 'shortcut' you
created?

if not, i again suggest asking of who you need to send info to. explain
problems. if there are familiar enough to be writing software for ms, then
they should be aware enough to inform you of what to do to send them what
they want.

explain to them all problems you are having and they should be able to
give you answer as to how to get what they want you to send to them.

[pop]

Jeff Layman said the following on 11/22/2011 1:43 PM:

create a new .zip file - drag and drop the link into the zip file then
you can drag the zip file to attach to the email. The recipient can then
unzip the shortcut to diagnose it's contents.
HTH
pop is Mark

[pop]

Jeff Layman said the following on 11/22/2011 11:36 AM:

> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.
>

[pop]

pop said the following on 11/22/2011 5:27 PM:

most backup programs understand links and realize you want to backup the
link and not the actual file. This includes windows backup programs such
as winzip, winrar, 7zip, etc; so any of these can be used to send a link
as an attachment whether the recipient can actually use the link to
access the file or not.
regards,
pop is Mark

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 23:26, pop wrote:
> Jeff Layman said the following on 11/22/2011 1:43 PM:

(snip)

>> the same as drag and drop?
>>
>> But it still hasn't answered the point of how you can sent a shortcut to
>> someone (however daft that might sound) if it is needed to resolve a
>> problem.
>>
> create a new .zip file - drag and drop the link into the zip file then
> you can drag the zip file to attach to the email. The recipient can then
> unzip the shortcut to diagnose it's contents.
> HTH
> pop is Mark

Unfortunately not. The zip creation takes place on the *.exe file, not
the shortcut.

--

Jeff

[Jeff Layman]

On 22/11/2011 19:50, Jay Garcia wrote:
> On 22.11.2011 13:43, Jeff Layman wrote:
>
> --- Original Message ---
>
>> But it still hasn't answered the point of how you can sent a shortcut to
>> someone (however daft that might sound) if it is needed to resolve a
>> problem.
>>
>
> If I am reading this correctly (probably not) you want to send a "file"
> by attaching it? You can't do that from a shortcut. A shortcut is a .lnk
> file that only points to the file located on YOUR drive, not the
> recipient's system. If you want to send a file to a recipient then you
> attach the file itself, not a shortcut.
>

No. I'm trying to send the shortcut itself (the *.lnk file - except you
can't see the extension!). For example, if I have a shortcut to TB on
my desktop, I'm trying to send the shortcut, not the Thunderbird.exe file.

--

Jeff

[Ray_Net]

In the past, i was able to transfer my shotcut(link) to another pc using
a file server - BUT it was UNUSABLE on the recipent pc.

So i don't believe that xferring a shorcut thru mail is a good idea.

[Ron Hunter]

If you could send the shortcut, would it be of use to the recipient? It
may be that you have a different OS, which would make the link file
useless, or the recipient may have installed the program on a different
drive, or.... Lots of ways this could be a problem, and not any that
wouldn't be a problem. Perhaps that is why you aren't able to do this.

[pop]

Jeff Layman said the following on 11/23/2011 1:59 AM:

Then you are doing it incorrectly: do not do "add to zip file"...
instead, create an empty .zip file, then drag and drop the shortcut to
the zip file - this will place the shortcut in the zip file and not the
target... at least that is how it works on my win7 PC.
give it a try
pop

[pop]

pop said the following on 11/23/2011 4:44 AM:

if you really want to do "add to zip file": (1) create an empty
directory (2) copy the shortcut to this directory (3) do an "add to zip
file" on the directory and the shortcut should show up in the zip file
(and NOT the target)
pop

[Jeff Layman]

Yes, that works. Thanks for clarifying how to do it. I'll get back to
the developer I was trying to send the shortcut to.

--

Jeff

[Jay Garcia]

The .lnk points to a location on YOUR drive, not necessarily on the
recipients drive. So then what's the purpose?

[Jay Garcia]

On 23.11.2011 04:55, Jeff Layman wrote:

--- Original Message ---

Right-click on the shortcut, select "Properties" and then take a
screenshot, send THAT to the developer if that's all you are trying to
do is to "show" them what it looks like.

[Beauregard T. Shagnasty]

Jay Garcia wrote:

> Jeff Layman wrote:
>> No. I'm trying to send the shortcut itself (the *.lnk file - except
>> you can't see the extension!). For example, if I have a shortcut to TB
>> on my desktop, I'm trying to send the shortcut, not the Thunderbird.exe
>> file.
>
> The .lnk points to a location on YOUR drive, not necessarily on the
> recipients drive. So then what's the purpose?

I had asked that, ahd he did explain in:
Message-ID: <toydnShiatBNdVbT...@mozilla.org>

[Greywolf]

On 22/11/2011 2:43 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> I got back to the developer who informed me that the way I had tried to
> get the shortcut there (copy and paste into "Programs") was not correct.
> Simply dragging it over the start button, waiting for the programs
> menu to expand, and dropping it where I wanted in the list was what was
> needed. I've just tried it and everything is works well. I can't see
> why that is different from what I tried - isn't copy and paste
> effectively the same as drag and drop?

No. Drag'n'drop on a shortcut AFAIK creates a new shortcut.

Wolf K.

[Greywolf]

On 22/11/2011 3:06 PM, clay wrote:
[...]

> A shortcut is simply a file.lnk* with a/path/to/somefile.exe in it.
> Opening it with a text editor would reveal this.
> In the old days, Properties showed the path and would 'Find' the target.
>
> Windows has done a grand job of obscuring all this for the user so

It's all still there, right click on the shortcut, Properties is at the
bottom of the menu, etc.

> (*Even with the suicidal default "Hide extensions of known file types"
> unchecked, Windows still hides extensions from us. For example: .lnk,
> .shs, .pif are all still hidden. Add any of these to the end of a name
> and watch the extension disappear.
> Search NeverShowExt in the registry to see all that are still hidden...)

Since those aren't created by a program, it's not necessary to know
them. Or that seems to be the thinking.

Wolf K.

[Greywolf]

On 22/11/2011 3:08 PM, gla...@linuxuser.iam wrote:
> On 11/22/2011 07:30 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
> <>
>
>
>> > It is most certainly possible to "open" a shortcut in a text editor such
>> > as notepad, but it doesn't seem possible to do it in a hex editor, as
>> > that sees the target instead.
> if shortcut is a true link, then therein lies a problem.
>
> this is where i would need to have an ms install, or access to one.
>
> as i have mentioned, iirc, there is/was another directory with information
> related to actual .exe file.

Not a directory, a file, the "registry". Which can be safely edited, if
you know what you're doing. ;-)

Wolf K.

[Greywolf]

Once you've opened it in Notepad, you can save as a *.txt file, and send
that. Not that it will do any good, the shortcut was created by Windows,
not the developer.

HTH
Wolf K.

[John H Meyers]

On 11/22/2011 1:43 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:

> But it still hasn't answered the point

> of how you can send a [Windows] shortcut to someone

> (however daft that might sound)
> if it is needed to resolve a problem.

Right click then "Send to" > "Compressed Folder" (a/k/a zip file),
then attach the compressed folder (zip file).

Here's a little scorecard about which of several programs
treat ".lnk" files as the link itself, vs. which "follow"
the link to act on its target instead
(in this case, the ".exe" file):

Notepad: displays .lnk file
Write (Wordpad): .exe file
EditPad by JGsoft : .exe file
Cygnus hex editor: .exe file
Thunderbird attachment: .exe file
Opera email attachment: .exe file
Eudora email attachment: .lnk file
Chrome (web browser): .exe file
"HashMyFiles" (by Nirsoft.net): .exe file

Of the wide variety of programs listed above,
only Notepad and Eudora do not "follow the link" to its target.

And finally, in a class by itself:

FrHed 1.0.156 (Free Hex Editor by Raihan Kibria):

"You are trying to open a link file.
Click on Yes if you want to open the file linked to,
or click on No if you want to open the link file itself.
Choose Cancel if you want to abort opening."

--

[Jeff Layman]

Interesting. Any reason why the Notepad, Eudora, and FrHed links behave
differently?

--

Jeff

[John H Meyers]

On 11/24/2011 4:14 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:

> Any reason why the Notepad, Eudora, and FrHed links behave differently?

Different programmers, having different minds :)

In Windows Explorer,
when links are _copied_ then only the .lnk file is copied,
while when links are _opened_ then the link is always followed,
to open the target object.

What to do in other situations (e.g. emailing) may not be so clear,
but since .lnk files are specific to individual computers,
it seems natural for the majority of programmers to assume
that the reference must mean to the target object,
rather than to the .lnk file itself.

In come cases, however, the file name continues to carry
a ".lnk" extension, even though the content is of the target object,
which seems to be a definite error.

FrHed was the only program I tested
which bothered to ask the user, and offer a choice.

It is also not so clear in Unix, where some programs
always follow ("symbolic") links and operate on target objects,
other programs do the opposite, and some programs
leave the matter to a user-selectable option.

Windows has various kinds of different "links" and "junctions"
(more, I think, than Unix' "symbolic" vs. "hard" links),
all of which complicate the total picture, to us laymen :)

What's the Latin translation of
"Let the user" (rather than buyer) "beware"?

--

[test...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, 22 November 2011 17:36:47 UTC, Jeff Layman wrote:
> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
>
> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.
>
>
>

> --
>
>
>
> Jeff

It might be a bit late to reply to this but I have recently had the same problem.
I wanted to email someone a link to an ftp site in windows explorer so that we could exchange files too big to attach to an email.
The link target is %systemroot%\explorer.exe ftp://username:password@ftphost details.
The idea being that “%systemroot%\explorer.exe” would find windows explorer on any windows system and the argument “ftp://username:password@ftphost details” would cause it to open the ftp host using the username and password given. The recipient (who was not really up to entering the details manually) could then copy / paste or drag and drop the files we wanted to share.
Anyway the only way I found to email the shortcut was to Zip it first. In normal cases the recipient would have to unzip it but in my case that was not necessary. The normal default program to view a zip file is windows explorer, so all they had to do was click on the zip file.
It worked for me
Mike

[mi...@wmlcps.org]

On Tuesday, November 22, 2011 12:36:47 PM UTC-5, Jeff Layman wrote:
> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I try
>
> to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets attached instead.
>
>
>
> --
>
>
>
> Jeff

What worked for me is right clicking on the shortcut, select "Send to Zip/Compressed folder" then attaching that to your email.

I wanted to share a network location link, and that was the easiest way for me. However, I'm try to email it now, and getting a ZIP is not allowed in gmail.

[Mike Easter]

mi...@wmlcps.org wrote:
> On Tuesday, November 22, 2011 12:36:47 PM UTC-5, Jeff Layman wrote:

Notice the date on the message you are replying. Over 30 months ago.

>> Any idea how to attach a Winows7 shortcut to an email message? If I
>> try to attach the shortcut, the *.exe file it points to gets
>> attachedinstead.

Googlegroups mangled formatting reformatted for clarity.

Notice the mangling of the formatting with extra lines which
googlegroups posting does to your message before I reformatted the lines
I cited above.

30 months ago, there was a 37 message conversation about this thread.
The old conversation can be seen in GG archive here
https://groups.google.com/d/topic/mozilla.support.thunderbird/tXvLLxvcVPI/discussion

> What worked for me is right clicking on the shortcut, select "Send

> toZip/Compressed folder" then attaching that to your email.

Answering an ancient thread is equivalent to starting the topic all over
again because the previous conversation is no longer 'salient'.

> I wanted to share a network location link, and that was the easiest
> way for me. However, I'm try to email it now, and getting a ZIP is not
> allowed in gmail.

Correct, no gmail .zip attachment. Also previously there was
significant discussion about the general inappropriateness of emailing a
.lnk file.

The best way to correspond in this newsgroup would be to use a news
agent such as Thunderbird and subscribe to this newsgroup on the mozilla
nntp news server.

http://ilias.ca/moznewsgroups-tb Subscribing to newsgroups on
news.mozilla.org with Mozilla Thunderbird


--
Mike Easter

[mari...@gmail.com]

Congratulation pop, you are the only one who honestly answered the initial question. The others, just to cover their ignorance, started to attack Jeff answering with question WHY...? ;-)