Updated - Automate Creating SharePoint and Insight Network Location Shortcuts

Several months ago I posted a script for automating the creation of SharePoint and Insight Network Location shortcuts.  Unfortunately that script only accounted for http addresses and failed to correctly implement https.  Thanks to a Chris who commented on the original post about the oversight with https addresses.  So without much ado, here is an updated version of that script which takes into account both http and https addresses.

You can download the script directly from here.

Or simply copy and paste the code below into a text file and save it with a .vbs file extension.

' CreateSharePointNetworkLocations
' Copyright (C) 2011, David C. Merritt, david.c.merritt@siemens.com
'
' This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
' it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
' the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
' (at your option) any later version.
'
' This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
' but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
' MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
' GNU General Public License for more details.
'
' You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
' along with this program.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
'
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
'
' A script to automate the creation of SharePoint network location
' shortcuts on Windows 7 clients.
'
' This script is particularly useful for those customers running Solid
' Edge Insight needing a way to automate the creation of the Insight
' required Network location shortcuts i.e. user logon scripts etc.
'
' To use edit, add and remove the array members ShortcutNames and
' ShortcutPaths.  Adjust the array counter accordingly to match the
' number of network locations to be created.
'
' This is a simple script and does minimal error checking. It should be
' fleshed out to best suit your specific needs and environment.
'
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
'
' 11/01/2011  merritt  initial release
' 02/23/2012  merritt  added support for https
' 02/27/2012  merritt  fixed http shortcuts broken by the https fix
' 02/27/2012  merritt  fixed port numbers in addresses
'

' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
' edit, add and remove your network locations below here
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
dim ShortcutNames(8), ShortcutPaths(8)
ShortcutNames(0) = "hsvnt416z06 - PreReleased"
ShortcutPaths(0) = "http://hsvnt416z06/Pre/PreDL"
ShortcutNames(1) = "hsvnt416z06 - Released"
ShortcutPaths(1) = "http://hsvnt416z06/Rel/RelDL"
ShortcutNames(2) = "hsvnt416z06 - Obsolete"
ShortcutPaths(2) = "http://hsvnt416z06/Obs/ObsDL"
ShortcutNames(3) = "hsvnt416z01 - PreReleased"
ShortcutPaths(3) = "http://hsvnt416z01:16133/Pre"
ShortcutNames(4) = "hsvnt416z01 - Released"
ShortcutPaths(4) = "http://hsvnt416z01:16133/Rel"
ShortcutNames(5) = "hsvnt416z01 - Obsolete"
ShortcutPaths(5) = "http://hsvnt416z01:16133/Obs"
ShortcutNames(6) = "SSL hsvnt416z01 - PreReleased"
ShortcutPaths(6) = "https://hsvnt416z01.net.plm.eds.com/Pre/PreDL"
ShortcutNames(7) = "SSL hsvnt416z01 - Released"
ShortcutPaths(7) = "https://hsvnt416z01.net.plm.eds.com/Rel/RelDL"
ShortcutNames(8) = "SSL hsvnt416z01 - Obsolete"
ShortcutPaths(8) = "https://hsvnt416z01.net.plm.eds.com/Obs/ObsDL"
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
' edit, add and remove your network locations above here
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------

' create network place shortcut for each location specified
intCounter = 0
For Each strShortcutName In ShortcutNames
    CreateNetworkPlace strShortcutName, ShortcutPaths(intCounter)
     intCounter = intCounter + 1
Next
wscript.echo "Network place shortcuts created"
WScript.Quit

' the subroutine that does all the work
Sub CreateNetworkPlace(strShortcutName, strShortcutPath)
    ' change our shortcut path to the Win 7 webdav format
    If InStr(UCase(strShortcutPath), UCase("https")) = 0 Then
        strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutPath, "http://", "\\")
        strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutMod, "/", "\DavWWWRoot\", 1, 1)
    Else
        strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutPath, "https://", "\\")
        strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutMod, "/", "@SSL\DavWWWRoot\", 1, 1)
    End If
    strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutMod, "/", "\")
    strShortcutMod = Replace(strShortcutMod, ":", "@")
   
    ' determine on the OS where to create the network place shortcut
    Const NETHOOD = &H13&
    Set objWSHShell = CreateObject("Wscript.Shell")
    Set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
    Set objFolder = objShell.Namespace(NETHOOD)
    Set objFolderItem = objFolder.Self
    strNetHood = objFolderItem.Path

    ' create the network place shortcut folder
    Set objFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    strShortcutFolder = strNetHood & "\" & strShortcutName
    If objFSO.FolderExists(strShortcutFolder) Then
        wscript.echo strShortcutFolder & " already exists"
    Else
        Set objFolder = objFSO.CreateFolder(strShortcutFolder)
       
        ' create the Desktop.ini file under the network place shortcut folder
        strDesktopIni = strShortcutFolder & "\Desktop.ini"
        If Not objFSO.FileExists(strDesktopIni) Then
            set fText = objFSO.OpenTextFile(strDesktopIni, 2, True)
            fText.WriteLine "[.ShellClassInfo]"
            fText.WriteLine "CLSID2={0AFACED1-E828-11D1-9187-B532F1E9575D}"
            fText.WriteLine "Flags=2"
            fText.Close
        End If

        ' set Desktop.ini with file attributes system & hidden
        Set fFile = objFSO.GetFile(strDesktopIni)
        fFile.Attributes = 6

        ' set network place shortcut folder as read-only
        Set fFolder = objFSO.GetFolder(strShortcutFolder)
        fFolder.Attributes = 1

        ' create the shortcut file target.lnk under the network place shortcut folder
        Set objShortcut = objWSHShell.CreateShortcut(strShortcutFolder & "\target.lnk")
        objShortcut.TargetPath = strShortcutMod
        objShortcut.Description = strShortcutPath
        objShortcut.Save
    End If
End Sub

Once you have the code, locate the section where indicated and change, add and remove your SharePoint URL network locations and the names for the shortcuts as necessary.

 

Save the script and run it.  Voilà!  Automated SharePoint Network Location shortcuts.

 

I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to incorporate any requests but if you would like to see certain functionality incorporated into this script it never hurts to ask :-)

As always YMMV but please feel free to give me feedback in the comments sections.  Thanks.

Update 02/27:  Doh!  When adding support for https addresses I accidentally broke http addresses and port numbers.  Thankfully  the error was caught and I have updated the script to fix this.  Now both http and https addresses along with port numbers work as expected.  My apologies for the mistake :-(