Customizing the notification area shortcut menu

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Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, Windows Server 2003 with SP2

Customizing the notification area shortcut menu

The notification area shortcut appears in the notification area of the taskbar when the user is connected to your service. The notification area shortcut menu appears when a user right-clicks this notification area shortcut. This menu provides users with a shortcut to specific programs. On the Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 family platforms, the default commands on the menu are Status, Disconnect, and Open Network Connections. You can use the CMAK wizard to customize the shortcut menu by specifying which, if any, additional commands appear on the menu.

For each command that you want to add to the menu (other than the default commands), in the Notification Area Shortcut Menu pane, click Add and then specify:

  • The name of the command as you want it to appear on the shortcut menu. If you do not specify a name for the command, the menu displays the file name and extension of the program to be run.

  • The file name (including the extension) of the program that runs when the user selects the associated command from the menu.

  • Any command-line parameters that you want to run with the program.

  • Whether to include the program file in the service profile. If the program is not part of the standard operating systems of the target platforms or is otherwise not available on your users' computers, you can include it in the service profile. At installation, the service profile copies the program to the \Cm\ServiceProfileFileName folder.

You can add keyboard access to a shortcut menu command by designating one of the letters in the command name as the access key. To specify an access key, type & immediately before the letter you want to use. For example, to add "Notepad" as a command name with the letter N specified as the access key, type &Notepad. When the user opens the shortcut menu, the access-key letter (N, in this example) is underlined in the command name (Notepad). The user would press N to carry out the Notepad command.

If you want to include the ampersand (&) character in the command name, type &&. For example, to use the command name Update & Refresh, type Update && Refresh. One ampersand appears in the shortcut menu, not as an access key. (Update & Refresh).

Notes

  • You can control whether a notification area shortcut appears in the notification area of the taskbar by editing the NoTrayIcon key in the [Connection Manager] section of the .cms file.

  • The default commands are not shown in the CMAK wizard in Shortcut menu commands or included in the service-profile files. They are part of the Connection Manager software and cannot be deleted.

  • Only .exe files and other shell executables (such as URLs and other files with registered extensions) are supported as menu commands. DLLs are not supported.

  • System macros are not supported for notification area shortcut commands.

For more information on using advanced customization techniques to edit the .cms file, see Advanced Customization.