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I have some 200 programs used by employees in the company I work for. To access these programs people have to login to a "menu" where they see the applications related to their jobs.

The programs are in one of our servers. Some of those employees have access to that server.

So it means they can see the executables and launch any of them.

How can I make them so no one can see or open them unless going through the "menu" app?

I hope my question is clear enough!

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You're missing quite a bit of crucial information, such as what operating system you're running on said server, if you're using something like Windows Terminal Services, etc. A "menu" doesn't tell us enough to help you. – Cole Feb 6 at 19:27
This is my 1st and you already downvoted me, cruel... Cruelness aside, it's a windows 2000 server and by "menu", I mean, a Visual Basic application that just lists the applications depending on who logs in. – Alex Feb 6 at 19:33
Remove direct access to the server for "those employees" you mention. Done. – TheCleaner Feb 6 at 20:36

closed as not a real question by mgorven, Brent Pabst, Michael Hampton, Dave M, Adrian Feb 6 at 21:28

It's difficult to tell what is being asked here. This question is ambiguous, vague, incomplete, overly broad, or rhetorical and cannot be reasonably answered in its current form. For help clarifying this question so that it can be reopened, see the FAQ.

2 Answers

up vote 3 down vote

Requiring that the "menu app" be used to launch the programs simply for the sake of requiring that seems like a silly waste of time. I'm hoping your goal is to prevent users who don't have need (or management authorization) to use a particular program from executing the program.

If that's the case, you're better off using NTFS permissions to arbitrate access to the programs. Obscuring the programs by way of hiding them behind a menu isn't really solving the problem.

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up vote 1 down vote

Change the shell from explorer.exe to something else like the menu application, so that it launches when each session starts instead of Explorer.

Of course, this doesn't work if users need to interact with Explorer.

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... or if users launch an application that they can then launch explorer from. – Jeff Ferland Feb 6 at 19:59

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