[Solved] How to add content to windows right click menu?
lazarus / 34-Windows

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loaded · 2022-07-19 07:59

Hi All,
I want to add content to right click menu in windows according to file
extension.
If anyone has worked on the subject before, I would appreciate it if
they could share their experiences. Respects.

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Thaddy · 2022-07-19 08:53

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-
versions//bb776881(v=vs.85)?redirectedfrom=MSDN

I can help you if you can not Pascalify it yourself. ( There are for
sure examples out there, btw)
Note this involves a shellextension and so on Windows 64 you need to
write the extension in 64 bit too.

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loaded · 2022-07-19 10:50

Thank you very much for the reply, Master Thaddy.
Quote from: Thaddy on July 19, 2022, 10:53:58 amI can help you if you
can not Pascalify it yourself.
Thank you very much for your offer. I don't want to take up your
precious time for this. The way you showed is good enough for me, I
hope I can handle the rest. Respects.

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Remy Lebeau · 2022-07-19 18:10

You don't actually need to write a Shell Extension to accomplish this,
unless you need to do some really advanced stuff (dynamic menus,
owner-drawn menus, etc).  Otherwise, a few Registry keys is all you
really need:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/shell/context-menu

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Thaddy · 2022-07-19 19:04

Quote from: Remy Lebeau on July 19, 2022, 08:10:00 pmYou don't
actually need to write a Shell Extension to accomplish this, unless
you need to do some really advanced stuff (dynamic menus, owner-drawn
menus, etc).  Otherwise, a few Registry keys is all you really need:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/shell/context-menu
But that will give you an appearance and a no show.

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lainz · 2022-07-19 21:07

Remember that from Windows 11 these menu are by default hidden. You
need to do other way for Windows 11.

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Thaddy · 2022-07-20 00:43

Correct. You need more than a few registry keys.

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loaded · 2022-07-20 05:02

Thank you very much Remy Lebeau and lainz for your answer suggestions.

Quote from: Remy Lebeau on July 19, 2022, 08:10:00 pmYou don't
actually need to write a Shell Extension to accomplish this, unless
you need to do some really advanced stuff (dynamic menus, owner-drawn
menus, etc).   Yes, that's right, I just wanted to process a simple
file extension.

Quote from: lainz on July 19, 2022, 11:07:04 pmRemember that from
Windows 11 these menu are by default hidden. You need to do other way
for Windows 11.
Yes, the classic behavior of windows

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Remy Lebeau · 2022-07-20 18:07

Quote from: Thaddy on July 19, 2022, 09:04:18 pmQuote from: Remy
Lebeau on July 19, 2022, 08:10:00 pmhttps://docs.microsoft.com/en-
us/windows/win32/shell/context-menu
But that will give you an appearance and a no show.

I don't understand what you are saying.  But in any case, using just
Shell registry keys, you can still make items for the right-click
context menu. The items just may take more steps to reach in the menu
(ie, using the "Show more options" item, or Shift-F10, etc), but the
registry items are still accessible.

Quote from: lainz on July 19, 2022, 11:07:04 pmRemember that from
Windows 11 these menu are by default hidden. You need to do other way
for Windows 11.

According to references I saw, Windows 11 wants us to customize the
context menu by implementing IExplorerCommand w/ an app identity
(implementing IContextMenu as @Thaddy suggested is just as old as
using Registry keys), or by using a Sparse manifest.  That is quite a
bit more work just for simple menu items.

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loaded · 2022-08-19 11:31

This is how I solved my problem indirectly though not directly.
https://wiki.freepascal.org/FileAssociation/fr