Modify Windows shortcuts using Python

Question

How do you change a Windows shortcut using Python?

e.g. from:

H:\My Music\some_file.mp3

to:

D:\Users\Myself\My Music\some_file.mp3

Answer 1

Here's another, more appropriate way to do this in Python with Winshell library: Using Python to create Windows shortcuts. In your case the code will look like:

import os, winshell
from win32com.client import Dispatch

desktop = winshell.desktop()
path = os.path.join(desktop, "some_file.mp3.lnk")
target = r"D:\Users\Myself\My Music\some_file.mp3"
wDir = r"D:\Users\Myself\My Music"
icon = r"D:\Users\Myself\My Music\some_file.mp3"

shell = Dispatch('WScript.Shell')
shortcut = shell.CreateShortCut(path)
shortcut.Targetpath = target
shortcut.WorkingDirectory = wDir
shortcut.IconLocation = icon
shortcut.save()

Existing shortcut should be deleted or rewritten. If you need it for batch processing of shortcut files then I think there's some way to read paths from existing shortcuts, but didn't managed to find it.

Answer 2

Jonathan's solution works perfectly. This is the useful function I produced implementing this. Simply pass in the name of the shortcut file (for example "Mozilla Firefox.lnk", it is unnecessary to specify the entire filepath), and the new shortcut destination, and it will be modified.

import os, sys
import pythoncom
from win32com.shell import shell, shellcon

def short_target(filename,dest):
    shortcut = pythoncom.CoCreateInstance (
        shell.CLSID_ShellLink,
        None,
        pythoncom.CLSCTX_INPROC_SERVER,
        shell.IID_IShellLink
    )
    desktop_path = shell.SHGetFolderPath (0, shellcon.CSIDL_DESKTOP, 0, 0)
    shortcut_path = os.path.join (desktop_path, filename)
    persist_file = shortcut.QueryInterface (pythoncom.IID_IPersistFile)
    persist_file.Load (shortcut_path)
    shortcut.SetPath(dest)
    mydocs_path = shell.SHGetFolderPath (0, shellcon.CSIDL_PERSONAL, 0, 0)
    shortcut.SetWorkingDirectory (mydocs_path)
    persist_file.Save (shortcut_path, 0)

The only dependency is the pywin32 library. Also note that one is able to specify options and arguments in their shortcut destination. To implement, just call:

short_target("shortcut test.lnk",'C:\\')   #note that the file path must use double backslashes rather than single ones. This is because backslashes are used for special characters in python (\n=enter, etc) so a string must contain two backslashes for it to be registered as one backslash character.

This example will set the destination of a shortcut on your desktop called "shortcut test" to a shortcut that opens up the file manager in the root directory of the hard drive (C:).