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POClearing the Windows "Run" dialog history without rebooting
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copied!<p>I am currently working on a program to immediately clear the list of previously-run-commands which appears in the Windows <em>Start</em> -> <em>Run</em> dialog. The procedure for clearing this list by removing the <em>HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RunMRU</em> key is <a href="http://support.microsoft.com/kb/142298" rel="nofollow noreferrer">well documented</a>; however, before these changes take effect, it seems to be necessary to do one of the following:</p> <ol> <li>Restart the computer</li> <li>Select <em>Start</em> -> <em>Shut down</em>, and then select <em>Cancel</em>.</li> </ol> <p>Neither of these is ideal for the task I am trying to accomplish: #1 is extremely disruptive to the user, and #2 appears to require additional user interaction.</p> <p>Does anyone know how to immediately (and programmatically) force a reload of this information without requiring any user interaction, <em>while also minimizing disruption of the user's other activities</em>? <strong>I would like for the user's Run history to be cleared out immediately after executing my program, <em>without</em> requiring any further action on their part (such as using the "Shut Down" -> "Cancel" trick in #2 above) or forcing a reboot.</strong></p> <p>Or, to approach the problem from a different angle: When clicking <em>Start</em> -> <em>Shut Down</em> -> <em>Cancel</em>, Windows Explorer reloads the RunMUI key. <strong>Is there a way to force a similar reload without having the user select <em>Shut Down</em> and then <em>Cancel</em>?</strong></p> <h2>Things I have already tried:</h2> <ul> <li>Monitoring the explorer.exe status using <a href="http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896645.aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">procmon</a> while selecting <em>Shutdown</em> and then <em>Cancel</em>. I see Explorer writing to the RunMRU key, but have not been able to determine what triggers this.</li> <li>Numerous Google searches along the lines of "reload runmru without reboot". Most results still recommend method #1 above, although a few suggest #2.</li> <li>Limited MSDN API examination. The <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms724867(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">RegFlushKey</a> call appears promising, but I haven't ever used it before, so I don't know if it will apply to registry information cached by different processes.</li> </ul> <p>Any suggestions or other information would be greatly appreciated.</p>

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