# Take Control of Windows 7 with "God Mode"



## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

Full article - http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10423985-56.html



> To enter "GodMode," one need only create a new folder and then rename the folder to the following:
> 
> GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}
> 
> Once that is done, the folder's icon will change to resemble a control panel and will contain dozens of control options. I'm not sure it's my idea of playing God, but it is a handy way to get to all kinds of controls.


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## njblackberry (Dec 29, 2007)

There have been some reports that this causes problems with 64 bit Windows 7 - it is working fine for me, however, on both 32 and 64 bit Windows 7.


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

That's a real eye-opener!

Thanks for sharing.


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## BubblePuppy (Nov 3, 2006)

Wow! I just created the folder for my Vista32 laptop. With 5-6 inches of snow predicted, I will have a lot to play with inside.
Thanks for the heads up and tip, Marlin Guy.
Might try it on my Vista64 laptop later.


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## Smthkd (Sep 1, 2004)

Just did this and WOW! Very nice for dorks like myself!


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## pfp (Apr 28, 2009)

Cool - thanks


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## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

BubblePuppy said:


> Might try it on my Vista64 laptop later.


The article states that some have had problems with Vista 64, so tread lightly.


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## Grentz (Jan 10, 2007)

It is interesting, but nothing really ground breaking like all the news sites have been blowing it up to be. All that stuff you can get to through control panel or other standard ways.


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## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

Yes, it's just convenient to have it all in one place, as opposed to having to rummage through all of the various places that MS hides things.


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## BubblePuppy (Nov 3, 2006)

Marlin Guy said:


> The article states that some have had problems with Vista 64, *so tread lightly*.


I will..thanks....


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

Grentz said:


> It is interesting, but nothing really ground breaking like all the news sites have been blowing it up to be. All that stuff you can get to through control panel or other standard ways.


True...it primarily is "Control Panel on steriods", with less navigation to get to many items...nut helpful to those who have to get in there regularly.


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## wingrider01 (Sep 9, 2005)

BubblePuppy said:


> Wow! I just created the folder for my Vista32 laptop. With 5-6 inches of snow predicted, I will have a lot to play with inside.
> Thanks for the heads up and tip, Marlin Guy.
> Might try it on my Vista64 laptop later.


5 to 6 - we must be in the path of the same storm - although the news now states a possiblity of 8 inches


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## Greg Alsobrook (Apr 2, 2007)

Interesting. I'll have to try this.


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## JM Anthony (Nov 16, 2003)

Yeah, that's pretty slick. I'd be interested in the back story from MSFT on this one.

John


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## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

I just set it up on a new W7 Dell box for someone and it's a great little time saver for configuring a new system.


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## thumperr (Feb 10, 2006)

Tried this on Vista32 with <Anything> in place of <GodMode> like this
Test.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

And it works with anything in front of the '.'


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## Movieman (May 9, 2009)

Pretty neat.


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

A very neat find indeed.

Makes one wonder, however, how many other "back door" tools are out there that we *don't* know about (*yet*)...


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

^^^^ Or when MS will send down a 'fix' to close this.


Does the key have to be the one quoted above or your own key?


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## thumperr (Feb 10, 2006)

Another article from Cnet with more information and additional shortcut keys.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10426627-56.html


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## barryb (Aug 27, 2007)

This is great!


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## tcusta00 (Dec 31, 2007)

hdtvfan0001 said:


> A very neat find indeed.
> 
> Makes one wonder, however, how many other "back door" tools are out there that we *don't* know about (*yet*)...


Maybe you can find out for us at CES? :lol:


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

Does this present any security issues like overriding permissions?


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## Marlin Guy (Apr 8, 2009)

thumperr said:


> Another article from Cnet with more information and additional shortcut keys.
> 
> http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10426627-56.html


Oh my!

{00C6D95F-329C-409a-81D7-C46C66EA7F33}
{0142e4d0-fb7a-11dc-ba4a-000ffe7ab428}
{025A5937-A6BE-4686-A844-36FE4BEC8B6D}
{05d7b0f4-2121-4eff-bf6b-ed3f69b894d9}
{1206F5F1-0569-412C-8FEC-3204630DFB70}
{15eae92e-f17a-4431-9f28-805e482dafd4}
{17cd9488-1228-4b2f-88ce-4298e93e0966}
{1D2680C9-0E2A-469d-B787-065558BC7D43}
{1FA9085F-25A2-489B-85D4-86326EEDCD87}
{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D}
{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}
{241D7C96-F8BF-4F85-B01F-E2B043341A4B}
{4026492F-2F69-46B8-B9BF-5654FC07E423}
{62D8ED13-C9D0-4CE8-A914-47DD628FB1B0}
{78F3955E-3B90-4184-BD14-5397C15F1EFC}

My guess would be that these will quickly become exploits and have to be shut down.
Rather irresponsible to even allow them to begin with. But, hey, we're talking about Microsoft here, the Swiss Cheese of Operating Systems. :lol:


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

Marlin Guy said:


> Oh my!
> {list of registry paths}
> My guess would be that these will quickly become exploits and have to be shut down.
> Rather irresponsible to even allow them to begin with. But, hey, we're talking about Microsoft here, the Swiss Cheese of Operating Systems. :lol:


... Why?
Those and other paths have been around in previous operating systems and have never been an issue.
And how are they going to become an exploit?


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## CopyCat (Jan 21, 2008)

This appears to be another developer back door, just like all the others that have been exploited and closed in the past. :lol:

 Most of their insecure developers leave little bits of bread for themselves to find their way back, only to be exploited by the hackers and cause more expense and fixes for the IT world.

Open Source is the way to go


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

These things are located in software all the time, typically as shortcuts for setup and configuration.....to save time.

A nice find, and likely not something MS would worry about...as it only consolidates existing capabilities into a convenient access point.


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

hdtvfan0001 said:


> These things are located in software all the time, typically as shortcuts for setup and configuration.....to save time.
> 
> A nice find, and likely not something MS would worry about...as it only consolidates existing capabilities into a convenient access point.


Precisely... All these Registry Paths are variants of what in the *NIX world are called symlinks.
These are just as "dangerous" as %WINDIR% leading to a windows systems windows directory.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

I'm tempted to try it ... but want to know first if anyone with Windows 7(x64) has already tried it and noticed any problems.


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

Drew2k said:


> I'm tempted to try it ... but want to know first if anyone with Windows 7(x64) has already tried it and noticed any problems.


Like what kind of problems!?
Consider it to be another version of the control panel.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

CJTE said:


> Like what kind of problems!?
> Consider it to be another version of the control panel.


No idea what kind, but up-thread there were posts with "warnings" that there could problems" on 64-bit systems...


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

Drew2k said:


> No idea what kind, but up-thread there were posts with "warnings" that there could problems" on 64-bit systems...


Some vista users (don't know which version) were crashing once the desktop loads because while the key is mostly generic, apparently it's not 100%.

They may have been using Vista OEM vs Retail and the OEM version didn't have that key in the registry so when the desktop loaded the machine tried to pull that key and it caused a reboot.

Other people were concerned that this would be some kind of "hack" or security override. Which, it is not. People are afraid of it because it uses a registry pointer.


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

For the record guys, now that I've taken a second look at "Godmode"
It's extremely similar to GPEDIT (Policy Editor) in Windows 2003/XP/2000.

I used that on a regular basis when deploying systems to clients. Sometimes it was to lock them/malware out of things (like changing the homepage), and other times it was to control ease-of-use. (For example, I do not like MRU lists).


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

CJTE said:


> For the record guys, now that I've taken a second look at "Godmode"
> It's extremely similar to GPEDIT (Policy Editor) in Windows 2003/XP/2000.
> 
> I used that on a regular basis when deploying systems to clients. Sometimes it was to lock them/malware out of things (like changing the homepage), and other times it was to control ease-of-use. (For example, I do not like MRU lists).


Well, I just took the plunge and created the folder on Drive D on a Win7-64 system. We'll see what happens - there sure are a lot of options!


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