How can I share favorites between users?

[sowellfan]

I am running Win XP Pro. My wife and I have
separate user accounts, but I find a lot of
different links that would be useful to her
when I'm on the web. I would like to be able
to have us both use the same set of favorites,
and not have to deal with importing/exporting.
Does anyone know how to accomplish this? Or
a link to information on the web would do, also.


Thanks,

Rich

 

[jlanka]

just change the location in this registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell\Folders\Favorites


<i>It's always the one thing you never suspected.</i>

 

[btvillarin]

Nice...that's a bookmark. I'll add that to my site and credit you. Thanks Jeff!

<A HREF="http://www.btvillarin.com" target="_new">btvillarin.com</A>
<font color=red>Site's back up! L33t!</font color=red>

 

[sowellfan]

Ok, I tried to follow directions, but it's not quiet
working out perfectly. (BTW, if anyone is having a
bit of trouble finding the registry key, it is in
...\Explorer\Shell Folders\Favorites, not
...\Explorer\Shell\Folders\Favorites .

So, the way I am attempting to do this is thus...
I run regedit to open the registry up. I go to the key, and the original key reads,
C:\Documents and Settings\Richard\Favorites
I right click on the Favorites key, click 'Modify',
then remove "Richard", type in "All Users", and click 'OK'.
Then, I can get out of regedit and come back, and as long
as I don't open a new session of explorer (when I regedit
I'm out of all programs, AFAIK), and the key reads the
same. However, as soon as I open Explorer and try to look
at the few favorites in the "All Users" directory, it
changes back to the Favorites in "Richard".

Am I somehow not logged in correctly? I'm pretty sure this
account has the right priviliges.

Thanks for any suggestions. I think I'm on the right track,
at least.

 

[jlanka]

BTW, if anyone is having a
bit of trouble finding the registry key, it is in
...\Explorer\Shell Folders\Favorites, not
...\Explorer\Shell\Folders\Favorites .

oops - typo.

I think I got it wrong - looks like the actual key is:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders\Favorites

Also, log off and back on before you start IE again.

<i>It's always the one thing you never suspected.</i>

 

[sowellfan]

Ok, I made the change, exited from regedit,
logged off, logged on, and then started
Explorer, and it's still referencing the favorites
under my account, not "All Users". It's as if
Explorer is referencing something somewhere that
tells the registry to go back to what it was.
Any ideas? (BTW, I am running Norton Utilites 2002,
if that might make a difference).

 

[jlanka]

Here's maybe a better way: Grab a copy of TweakUI from the MS website (downloads). On the My Computer tab you can change the location of various things, among them Favorites.

<i>It's always the one thing you never suspected.</i>

 

[sowellfan]

Ok, using Tweak UI fixed it. I had actually
downloaded it and tried it before I started
asking questions here. I guess I just didn't go
deep enough into the different trees to find the
Favorites option. I'm still not sure what it did
differently from what I had done with regedit, but
with Tweak UI I actually picked the folder, rather
than typing it in as with regedit. I am thinking
that once I tried to open Explorer, it tried to reach
the directory I typed in, couldn't find it for some
reason, and then went back to the default, which would
be C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Favorites

Anyway, thanks a lot.

Rich