An Unofficial Guide to the URL File Format

3rd Edition

Copyright 1998-2004 Edward L. Blake

All Rights Reserved



 

No part of this document may be reproduced in any form, mechanically or digitally, or transmitted or redistributed in any form by any means without the prior written permission from the author, Edward L. Blake. Edward Blake can be contacted at http://www.edwardblake.name/contact

 

 

This article is an update to my previous postings on wotsit.org. A new update to this article (2004) is finally changing around the modified field decoding to using, the more correct method, FILETIME and FileTimeToSystemTime.

 

Disclaimer: Please note that I am not the person, and I’m not involved with the one(s), who made the URL format. The information presented here is at most a description of how a URL file looks like and how to read it based on my experimentation and experience. Credit is given within the article for feedback and corrections on earlier content,

 

THE URL FORMAT

 

The classic URL file format is pretty simple; it has a format similar to an INI file:

 

Sample URL File:

_______________________________________________________

 

[InternetShortcut]

URL=http://www.someaddress.com/

WorkingDirectory=C:\WINDOWS\

ShowCommand=7

IconIndex=1

IconFile=C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\url.dll

Modified=20F06BA06D07BD014D

HotKey=1601

_______________________________________________________

 

The syntax of the file format is like the following:

 

[Group\Section]

Field=Value

Field=Value

.

.

 

Each line terminates with CR and LF characters, and uses ANSI as it’s character set. The files can be manipulated using basic file I\O or the GetPrivateProfileString, GetPrivateProfileSection, WritePrivateProfileSection, WritePrivateProfileSring API functions provided by Windows.

URL

The URL field is self-explanatory. It’s the address location of the page to load. It should be a fully qualifying URL with the format protocol://server/page. A URL file is not restricted to the HTTP protocol. In general, at least, whatever that can be saved as a favorite is a valid URL.

 

 

WorkingDirectory

It’s the “working folder” that your URL file uses. The working folder is possibly the folder to be set as the current folder for the application that would open the file. However Internet Explorer does not seem to be affected by this field.

Note: this setting does not seem to appear in some versions of Internet Explorer/Windows.

 

 

IconIndex

The Icon Index within the icon library specified by IconFile. In an icon library, which can be generally be either a ICO, DLL or EXE file, the icons are indexed with numbers. The first icon index starts at 0.

 

 

IconFile

Specifies the path of the icon library file. Generally the icon library can be an ICO, DLL or EXE file. The default icon library used tends to be the URL.DLL library on the system’s Windows\System directory

 

 

Modified

This field is generally the most cryptic of all the fields.

Example: Modified=20F06BA06D07BD014D

For a while some vague calculations were given on this page for calculating the date and time of the modified field, but since the first posting of this article I’ve received a lot of input from other people that have experimented with this field:

 

Changes at a fast pace

Changes slowly

C

C0

34

90

B3

07

DC

C3

01

DE

 

Thanks goes to Shawn K. Hall, Jeff Dickey, Ken Schenke, Vivian De Smedt, David Jones, Frank Stocker, and possibly others (I’ve lost some mail since a few years ago) for pointing out this is a FILETIME structure (this article has last been updated in late 2000, basically 3-4 years, so I’ve been late to rewrite this section), The first 8 hex bytes are the FILETIME structure, the last hex byte is found to be a checksum and is unimportant. Since this is a FILETIME structure, you can pass it to the FileTimeToSystemTime API call to get all the discrete date and time elements. However the first 8 hex bytes need to be inverted before passing in to FileTimeToSystemTime. Therefore:

 

C0

34

90

B3

07

DC

C3

01

DE

Invert

Rem.

01

C3

DC

07

B3

90

34

C0

 

High DW = 01 C3 DC 07

Low DW = B3 90 34 C30

 

FileTimeToSystemTime

 

16/1/2004 08:06:53

 

 

 

I’ve wrote a small VB6 demonstration that does this task.

 

ShowCommand

(Nothing) - Normal

7         - Minimized

3         - Maximized

Note: this setting does not seem to appear in some versions of Internet Explorer/Windows.

 

 

HotKey

The HotKey field specifies what is the shortcut key used to automatically launch the Internet shortcut. The field uses a number to specify what hotkey is used.

 

833 – Ctrl + Shift + A

834 – Ctrl + Shift + B

835 – Ctrl + Shift + C

.

.

1345 – Shift + Alt + A

1346 – Shift + Alt + B

1347 – Shift + Alt + C

.

.

1601 – Ctrl + Alt + A

1602 – Ctrl + Alt + B

1603 – Ctrl + Alt + C

.

Refer to Appendix A for a more complete table of hotkeys.

 

EXTENDED URL FORMAT

Sometimes the URL file will provide more information when it is saved as a Favorite with the following format:

 

[DEFAULT]

BASEURL=url

 

[DOC#n(#n#n#n…)]

BASEURL=url

ORIGURL=url

 

Sample URL File with extended URL fields:

_______________________________________________________

 

[DEFAULT]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com

[DOC#4#5]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame1.html

ORIGURL=frame1.html

[DOC#4#6]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame2.html

ORIGURL=frame2.html

[InternetShortcut]

URL=http://www.someaddress.com/

_______________________________________________________

 

The purpose of these extra fields is probably for the browser to figure out what HTML documents were loaded in each frame, since the main URL tends to not record the state of its framesets. If you navigate to a framed site, click on a frame link (which changes one of the frames), and add the page to your favorites, the state of the framesets is preserved. When a frame is nested inside another frame, the frame’s section name has the same first numbers, and another few numbers appended, like the following:

 

Sample URL File with extended URL fields and nested frames:

_______________________________________________________

 

[DEFAULT]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com

[DOC#4#5]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame1.html

ORIGURL=frame1.html

[DOC#4#5#4#6]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame1a.html

ORIGURL=frame1a.html

[DOC#4#5#4#7]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame1b.html

ORIGURL=frame1b.html

[DOC#4#6]

BASEURL=http://www.someaddress.com/frame2.html

ORIGURL=frame2.html

 [InternetShortcut]

URL=http://www.someaddress.com/

_______________________________________________________

 

SETTINGS NOT STORED IN THE URL FORMAT

 

Visits

“Make this page available offline”

Synchronization settings

Download Settings

Schedule Settings

 

 

LINKS

 

 

Information on many other file formats

http://www.wotsit.org/

 

Author’s Web Site

http://www.cyanwerks.com/

 

Contacting the author

 

http://www.edwardblake.name/contact

 



 

APPENDIX A – HotKey Reference

 

 

C+S

S+A

C+A

C+S+A

 

C+S

S+A

C+A

C+S+A

A

833

1345

1601

1857

0

817

1329

1584

1841

B

834

1346

1602

1858

1

818

1330

1585

1842

C

835

1347

1603

1859

2

819

1331

1586

1843

D

836

1348

1604

1860

3

820

1332

1587

1844

E

837

1349

1605

1861

4

821

1333

1588

1845

F

838

1350

1606

1862

5

822

1334

1589

1846

G

839

1351

1607

1863

6

823

1335

1590

1847

H

840

1352

1608

1864

7

824

1336

1591

1848

I

841

1353

1609

1865

8

825

1337

1592

1849

J

842

1354

1610

1866

9

826

1338

1593

1850

K

843

1355

1611

1867

;

954

1466

1722

1978

L

844

1356

1612

1868

=

955

1467

1723

1979

M

845

1357

1613

1869

,

956

1468

1724

1980

N

846

1358

1614

1870

-

957

1469

1725

1981

O

847

1359

1615

1871

.

958

1470

1726

1982

P

848

1360

1616

1872

/

959

1471

1727

1983

Q

849

1361

1617

1873

`

960

1472

1728

1984

R

850

1362

1618

1874