Fulfiling my Random OS at Boot-up dream.

Spiderkeys

Member
Not really a wish because I kind of fulfilled it

One thing that's bothered me on Windows Boot Manager, is that you can only select a default OS, to boot up on, this is hard if I like all of them equally, so I got to wait until it passes POST, then close my eyes and randomy press up/down/up/down, etc then ENTER to pick one for the day.

That was harder than it seems, because I know if I press Too many UPs or DOWNs with the arrows in a row it will just pick the first one on the list or the last one.

So I had an idea, with the help of AHK (AutoHotKey) used as start-up script at bootup, it can change the default OS invisibility without my knowledge which of course what I want.

All I needed to know was the identifier numbers of my OS's, which EasyBCD nicely gives you this information.

My code is:

#NoTrayIcon
version=01.004
Title=Start up Script
UsageLog=C:\Logs\Usage.log

;; STARTING MESSAGE

FileAppend, `n%A_DDD% %A_DD%/%A_MM%/%A_YYYY% %A_Hour%:%A_Min%:%A_Sec% Executed "%Title% V%Version%", %UsageLog%
FileAppend, `n , %UsageLog%

;; Randomness!

FileAppend, `nRandomness..., %UsageLog%

;; Random Default OS for Windows Boot Manager (Be Careful here...)

Random, rand, 1, 4

IfEqual, rand, 1
{
FileAppend, `n - Changed your default OS to Windows 2000., %UsageLog%
run, bcdedit /default {b1f37a0d-bbfd-11e5-b38b-b91e4105f03b}
}
IfEqual, rand, 2
{
FileAppend, `n - Changed your default OS to Windows XP., %UsageLog%
run, bcdedit /default {73bdae4b-3770-11e5-a7a0-a684bd81c0e4}
}
IfEqual, rand, 3
{
FileAppend, `n - Changed your default OS to Windows Vista., %UsageLog%
run, bcdedit /default {b1f37a05-bbfd-11e5-b38b-b91e4105f03b}
}
IfEqual, rand, 4
{
FileAppend, `n - Changed your default OS to Windows 8.1., %UsageLog%
run, bcdedit /default {b1f37a04-bbfd-11e5-b38b-b91e4105f03b}
}


This is great if I boot up Vista or Windows 8.1, but if it gets to Windows XP or 2000, it doesn't understand the command BCDEDIT, so I be stuck in one of those until I boot up Vista or 8.1 again.

So any suggestions here, it there an easy way, a function I didn't even know off, or can you edit Windows 2000/XP using the command prompt?


 
Quite the interesting request. Out of curiosity, if you like them all equally is there a reason you don't just use one of them?
 
If you hold down either up/down arrow, it will cycle through the list continuously.
It doesn't stop at top/bottom, just leaps to the other end and goes round again, so you should be able to get a random selection.
You must have very compliant application software if you really don't mind which OS is running.
I stick with W7 because it's the only OS capable of running everything I need. Earlier, and more sadly, later Windows are incapable of running e.g. WMC.
 
I was probably presuming that then, but like 90% of the time I always just the first or the last on the list, while the middle entries always got left out in the cold, but yeah below Windows 7, things just getting a pain, and there's Windows 10 that once messed up my neat bootloader entires by installing updates once.
 
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