Binaryworld - Open a Control Panel dialog or wizard ... [ VB -> Windows ]

Have you ever needed to open a Windows dialog such as Internet Properties, New Hardware, Modem Properties or any other dialog you can find in the Control Panel? Well, it's very simple, onve you know the trick.

All these dialogs are implemented in files with the CPL extension. (They're actually DLLs with their extension changed.) All you have to do is call the appropriate function in these DLLs. Windows provides an application called "rundll32.exe" - located in Windows main directory - that allows you to do that. For example, to open the Mouse Properties dialog you should write this line in the Run dialog:

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rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL main.cpl @0

If you know the correct syntax, you can open these dialogs from your applications as well. here is a routine that can open most of the Control Panel dialogs. It takes a value specified in a Enum list and uses it to determine the correct string to pass to "rundll32.exe", then passes the full commnad line to the Shell function:

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Public Enum mbDialogType
  mbNewHardware
  mbAddRemove
  mbDateTimeProp
  mbDisplayProp
  mbInternetProp
  mbGameProp
  mbKeyboardProp
  mbModemProp
  mbMouseProp
  mbMultimediaProp
  mbNetworkProp
  mbPasswordProp
  mbInternationalProp
  mbSoundProp
  mbSystemProp
End Enum

Sub OpenWindowsDialog(ByVal mbDialog As mbDialogType)
  Dim s As String
  Select Case mbDialog
    Case mbNewHardware: s = "sysdm.cpl @1"
    Case mbAddRemove: s = "appwiz.cpl,,1"
    Case mbDateTimeProp: s = "timedate.cpl"
    Case mbDisplayProp: s = "desk.cpl,,0"
    Case mbInternetProp: s = "inetcpl.cpl,,0"
    Case mbGameProp: s = "joy.cpl"
    Case mbKeyboardProp: s = "main.cpl @1"
    Case mbModemProp: s = "modem.cpl"
    Case mbMouseProp: s = "main.cpl @0"
    Case mbMultimediaProp: s = "mmsys.cpl,,0"
    Case mbNetworkProp: s = "netcpl.cpl"
    Case mbPasswordProp: s = "password.cpl"
    Case mbInternationalProp: s = "intl.cpl,,0"
    Case mbSoundProp: s = "mmsys.cpl @1"
    Case mbSystemProp: s = "sysdm.cpl,,0"
  End Select
  Shell "rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL " & s, 5
End Sub