Control Panel Items

Since I'm on a roll with configuring stuff, there is a nice article on MSDN about configuring Control Panel Items. If you are a setup developer, this link will take you to the section that you should read.

Some things to note:

• "...the DLL file must have a .cpl file name extension" - These control panel items ARE DLL's.
• on "Windows 2000 and later systems, new Control Panel items should be installed in the associated application's folder." - Yep, no installation to SYSTEM like the old days!
• The placement of a registry key dictates what shows up in the Control Panel. Remember to respect per-user installations! (Yes! it is a bug, a security one, and a bad one)
• If you must support the "old" pre-Windows 2000 method, only do so on the pre-2000 OS.
• Yes. you can extend System Control Panel Items.
• You can also specify a category for the item in Windows XP or better, for users using the default control panel view.
• For MSI folks, there is nothing in any of the Standard Actions that will help you.