Making a shortcut for the Skype Metro application

Question

In the accepted answer to this question, it is described how to make a shortcut for any Metro app, which you can then place in the startup folder.

Example:

By making a shortcut, People.url, which points to "wlpeople:", and placing it under the path, "%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup", one can make the People app start up along with Windows.

I'm close to doing the same, but with the Skype app:

My attempt at making the Skype Metro app start up with windows:

By making a shortcut, Skype.url, which points to "skype:", and placing it under the path, "%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup", one can make the Skype app start up along with Windows.

This shortcut will start up the Skype app, however, if the app is not already running, the app will hang when starting up.

Can anyone tell me how to fix this? Am I using the wrong shortcut, or do I perhaps need to supply it with some arguments?

Solution

In a related question I've asked, someone posted a script which led me to a solution. Possibly not the best one, but hey, it works:

• Copy-paste the following into notepad:

Script:

Set objShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
objShell.SendKeys "^{ESC}"
WScript.Sleep 1000
objShell.SendKeys WScript.Arguments.Item(0)
WScript.Sleep 1000
objShell.SendKeys "{ENTER}"

• Save it as "launch.vbs".

• Make a shortcut to this script and name it anything, e.g. "Skype".

• Edit the target path of the shortcut to the following:

(PATH is the path to the script.)

"PATH\launch.vbs" skype

• You now have a shortcut to Skype, which can e.g. be placed in the startup folder to add the app to the Windows startup.

Comments

[Ramhound]

Have you checked to see if Skype has "start when computer is booted" or something along those lines?

[phaz]

@Ramhound - Yes, it doesn't. It doesn't seem like any apps have that feature for that matter, which is why I'm trying such a roundabout way. It would be nice though if Skype had a "start up in the background" feature or something along those lines. :-)

[Kian]

You can actually reduce the WScript.Sleep time to something like 100ms rather than 1000 (at least on faster computers) which makes the fact that it's just emulating keyboard presses less obvious