Changing calculator button on the DELL keyboard?
JDa™©
default? Its a Dell model KS-8135 keyboard.
Currently this keyboard button starts up the standard default Microsoft
*Vista* calculator.
I have installed the Microsoft Calculator Plus V1.0 program that came
from the *XP* Plus series of applications and wish to use this program
as my default.
The only 2 differences between the programs are, "Conversion" capibility
and the Skin color, additions to the Plus calculator.
TIA
JDa
Journey
a worthwile free utility to know about. I remap the Delete key on
Dell notebooks to be the right control. Having such a frequently used
key the 3rd from the top left is ridiculous.
http://webpages.charter.net/krumsick/
It allows you to remap keys. Maybe you can remap your key to do what
you want.
The other thing you can do is set up a Windows shortcut to bring up
the calculator you want. Right click the calculator in the Programs
menu, and you can put your shortcut in there. Very handy.
On Sat, 21 Apr 2007 12:02:27 -0400, JDa櫓 <JDaN...@nospam.net>
wrote:
Tom Scales
"JDa™©" <JDaN...@nospam.net> wrote in message
news:VzqWh.12523$XU4....@bignews8.bellsouth.net...
Find the two programs on the hard disk. Say they are VCalc.exe and
Calcplus.exe.
Rename VCalc.exe OldCalc.exe
copy CalcPlus.exe to VCalc.exe
The keyboard will invoke VCalc and you'll get what you want.
JDa™©
This would be the best way but, the program is signed and the new system
security will not let me change the name.
And Vista complains to high heaven that something bad is going to happen
when I try to rename the program!
Oh and its just calc.exe not vcalc.exe
I'll keep looking.
Thanks again.
JDa
JDa™©
I believe your right in saying that I want be able to use the program,
though I might try.
1st is the age of the program, 2nd is the Dell keyboard is a USB HID
(Human Interface Device).
and I'll have to research to see if it uses the same Microsoft's
/Scancode Map/ registry keys,
and to top that off I've tried loading a couple of game programs that
said the VB runtime lib
was not on the machine and the KeyTweak program makes use of the VB
runtime lib.
So putting a shortcut to the Plus calculator appears to be the best way,
thing I'll put it in the
Quick launch area.
Thanks Journey
JDa
for Journey wrote:
> I doubt this is what you want, but it might be. Even if it's not it's
> a worthwile free utility to know about. I remap the Delete key on
> Dell notebooks to be the right control. Having such a frequently used
> key the 3rd from the top left is ridiculous.
>
> http://webpages.charter.net/krumsick/
>
> It allows you to remap keys. Maybe you can remap your key to do what
> you want.
>
> The other thing you can do is set up a Windows shortcut to bring up
> the calculator you want. Right click the calculator in the Programs
> menu, and you can put your shortcut in there. Very handy.
>
> On Sat, 21 Apr 2007 12:02:27 -0400, JDa™© <JDaN...@nospam.net>
Journey
wrote:
>So putting a shortcut to the Plus calculator appears to be the best way,
>thing I'll put it in the
>Quick launch area.
>
>Thanks Journey
>JDa
You're welcome. Tom's answer is your best bet.
Journey
wrote:
>> Find the two programs on the hard disk. Say they are VCalc.exe and
>> Calcplus.exe.
>>
>> Rename VCalc.exe OldCalc.exe
>> copy CalcPlus.exe to VCalc.exe
>>
>> The keyboard will invoke VCalc and you'll get what you want.
>Tom (thanks)
>This would be the best way but, the program is signed and the new system
>security will not let me change the name.
>And Vista complains to high heaven that something bad is going to happen
>when I try to rename the program!
>Oh and its just calc.exe not vcalc.exe
>I'll keep looking.
>Thanks again.
>JDa
Based on what you said this probably wouldn't work but you could
rename the program in a folder outside of the one you want to change
and then copy it to the folder and see if it lets you overwrite it. It
shouldn't, but sometimes brute-force hacking works. I don't know much
about Vista security, but I'd make sure to be administrator, and turn
off the security notification (whatever it's called). Worth a try.
Oh and before you do that, right click on properties on the file you
want to replace to see if there are any settings that might be
preventing you from replacing it.
Always take my advice with a grain of salt. I'm just a hack :-)
nemox
change the following key:
HKLM/software/microsoft/windows/currentversion/explorer/appkey/18/
with shellexecute value of calc.exe.
change it so that shellexecute has a value of powercalc.exe (or
whatever program you want to launch - if it is not in the system32
folder, you will probably need the entire path).
tech_jeremy
nemox;1018784 Wrote:
> change the following key:
>
> HKLM/software/microsoft/windows/currentversion/explorer/appkey
Just want to confirm that this is the correct answer. On my system with
a U473D dell keyboard there are 5 keys under AppKey, and they correspond
to these buttons:
7: the "home" button- launches the default browser.
(default string name is "Association" and value is "http" )
15: the mail button
(default string name is "Association" and value is "mailto" )
16: the music note button
(default string name is "Association" and value is ".cda" )
17: the "Computer" button
(default string name is "ShellExecute" and value is the guid for "My
Computer" )
18: the calculator button
(default string name is "ShellExecute" and value is "Calc.exe" )
Microsoft's info on this can be found at
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg463446 -- the info
about ShellExecute and Association is all the way to the very bottom of
the page.
Jeremy