I was messing around on my XP VM, and found something

edited May 2015 in Software
This is not an offer or request. I am also doing this in a VM, this is not my primary OS. This is also not a hackjob, I purchased this from a shop back in 2007.

Regardless of all the security issues Internet Explorer 6 presented, I always seemed to like it's interface more than that of modern browsers.

Anyway, I started messing around with it by opening random files with explorer.exe. I tried a text file, and it worked, so I got a little more interested in attempting to browse with it.
I opened files like PNGs with it, and it also seemed to work. But opening an htm or html file failed to work.

As far as I know, XP did mostly ditch the HTT folder layout system. I found a couple HTT files in C:\WINDOWS\Web, so I opened one with Explorer, and it actually worked. It viewed it as if it were IE6.

So, I created an HTT on my desktop. It just had a simple link to Google, and it actually brought me there in the explorer interface.

I looked online to see if anyone did the same, but it seems no one else did.

Comments

  • The interface for IE 4, 5, and 6 was mostly a clone of Netscape 3 and 4. The closest thing to that these days is Mozilla SeaMonkey.

    Back when IE 4 was released, Microsoft assumed everyone was going to use HTML pages for local folder and desktop content - or they would find some way to make everyone. The full truth was, those features were just a lame excuse to support the claim to the DOJ that IE was "integrated".
  • I used to have a customized layout for my documents folder. I made back when 2000 was my main OS. In fact, it's actually still there if you browse to my documents on an XP machine. XP may have removed the interface for creating the customization's, but it definitely still supported the existing configs.
  • Took a quick screenshot.

    Capture.png

    As you can see, I also have IE8.
  • Did you know that when you install IE8 it moves the old browser files to C:\Windows\IE8 ? You can run the iexplore.exe in there and freely use the IE6 shell, but the system will still use IE8's rendering engine.

    From your spawned IE window, try going to whatbrowser.org to see if you've found a roundabout way of doing the same thing.
  • I knew that, but
    1. For some reason, on some PCs I run the IEXPLORE application on, the application instantly crashes.
    2. If I do manage to run it, it is way more slow and images mostly fail to load.

    Aside from the limitations, I do prefer my .HTT method.
  • For the longest time IE and windows explorer were pretty well integrated. In fact you couldn't even uninstall IE because of this. As far as the HTML .htt files go, you can actually set your desktop to use them as backgrounds.

    Anyone remember "Active Desktop"?
  • Ahh, yes... good old active desktop...

    activedesktop.png
  • Ah the good er, shit old days of having to enable that shit just to use .jpg as a background. Ugh.
  • BlueSun wrote:
    Ahh, yes... good old active desktop...

    activedesktop.png

    Wish the upvote system was still here....
  • BOD wrote:
    Ah the good er, shit old days of having to enable that shit just to use .jpg as a background. Ugh.

    I remember having to do deal with that a lot because Windows 98SE was so unstable.
  • I only saw the Active Desktop error once on an XP, but I was using an RSS feed as a desktop item.
  • can you this with windows xp betas
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