Create Windows Shortcuts for Remote Development

A couple months ago I decided to posted about manually creating shortcuts for handling remote development. Below is a function that will create a shortcut and will attach an icon to the shortcut.

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Source:

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function Create-Shortcut([string] $shortcutName, [string] $target, [string] $username, [string] $iconTarget, [string] $workingDirectory="") {  $WshShell = New-Object -comObject WScript.Shell;  $Shortcut = $WshShell.CreateShortcut("$Home\Desktop\$shortcutName`.lnk");  Write-Host "C:\Windows\System32\runas.exe /user:$username /netonly `"$target`"";  $Shortcut.TargetPath = "C:\Windows\System32\runas.exe"  $Shortcut.Arguments = "/user:$username /netonly `"$target`"";  if ([string]::IsNullOrEmpty($iconTarget)) {   $Shortcut.IconLocation = "$target, 0";  } else {   $Shortcut.IconLocation = $iconTarget;  }  $Shortcut.WorkingDirectory = $workingDirectory;  $Shortcut.Save(); }

Here is the full script that will do the heavy lifting. The only limitation is that you still need to set the shortcuts to "Run as administrator" in the advanced settings. I have not found a successful way to programatically set the flag, so for now, it will have to be a manual process.

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Script Source:

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param(  [string] $ProjectPrefix = "TEST", # $(Read-Host "Project Prefix"),  [string] $userName = "domain\user" # $(Read-Host "Username") )   function Main {  Create-Shortcut "$ProjectPrefix Visual Studio 2010" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe" $userName;  Create-Shortcut "$ProjectPrefix SQL Server Management Studio" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\100\Tools\Binn\VSShell\Common7\IDE\Ssms.exe" $userName;  Create-Shortcut "$ProjectPrefix Visual Studio Command Line" "%comspec% /k `"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat`" x86" $userName -iconTarget "%comspec%, 0";  Create-Shortcut "$ProjectPrefix LINQPad 4" "C:\Program Files (x86)\LINQPad\LINQPad.exe" $userName;  Create-Shortcut "$ProjectPrefix Internet Explorer" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe" $userName; }   function Create-Shortcut([string] $shortcutName, [string] $target, [string] $username, [string] $iconTarget, [string] $workingDirectory="") {  $WshShell = New-Object -comObject WScript.Shell;  $Shortcut = $WshShell.CreateShortcut("$Home\Desktop\$shortcutName`.lnk");  Write-Host "C:\Windows\System32\runas.exe /user:$username /netonly `"$target`"";  $Shortcut.TargetPath = "C:\Windows\System32\runas.exe"  $Shortcut.Arguments = "/user:$username /netonly `"$target`"";  if ([string]::IsNullOrEmpty($iconTarget)) {   $Shortcut.IconLocation = "$target, 0";  } else {   $Shortcut.IconLocation = $iconTarget;  }  $Shortcut.WorkingDirectory = $workingDirectory;  $Shortcut.Save(); }   & Main;

C# AES Encryption & Decryption Methods

I had a hard time finding a set of functions to handle AES encryption and decryption correctly so I figured I would share working ones with the world.

Suppose the application has it's secret values securely loaded. Below is not a secure way to handle this, but for the purpose of this post we will be overly transparent.

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Secrets:

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key = "PasswordP@s$w0rdPa$$w0rdP@ssw0rd"; salt = "S@lt$@ltSa|tSaltS@lt$a|t$@|tSalT"; iv = "iv1^!vi^1viV!^iv"; // length must be 16 bytes

Here is an example of it's potential use.

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Encryption Extension Methods:

1 2	cipherText = clearText.Encrypt(key, salt, iv); clearText2 = cipherText.Decrypt(key, salt, iv);

Below is the section of code that handles the encryption and decryption of the strings. Feel free to change 72 to a different number; if you change it here, you MUST change the Decrypt function to use the same number of rounds. This is used to figure out how many rounds of encryption will occur. Note that fewer rounds is faster but potentially less secure and the opposite for more rounds.

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Source:

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/// <summary> /// Encrypts text given default values /// </summary> /// <param name="PlainText">/// <param name="Password">/// <param name="Salt">Password Salt value/// <param name="InitialVector">16 character string/// <returns></returns> public static string Encrypt(this string PlainText, string Password, string Salt, string InitialVector) {     return PlainText.Encrypt(Password, Salt, "SHA1", 72, InitialVector, 256); }   /// <summary> /// Encrypts a string given set of parameters /// </summary> /// <param name="PlainText">/// <param name="Password">/// <param name="Salt">/// <param name="HashAlgorithm">/// <param name="PasswordIterations">/// <param name="InitialVector">/// <param name="KeySize">/// <returns></returns> public static string Encrypt(this string PlainText, string Password, string Salt, string HashAlgorithm, int PasswordIterations, string InitialVector, int KeySize) {     try     {         byte[] PlainTextBytes = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(PlainText);         byte[] CipherTextBytes;         using (ICryptoTransform Encryptor = CreateRijndael(Password, Salt, HashAlgorithm, PasswordIterations, InitialVector, KeySize, CryptoTransformDirection.Encrypt))         {             using (MemoryStream MemStream = new MemoryStream())             {                 using (CryptoStream cryptoStream = new CryptoStream(MemStream, Encryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Write))                 {                     cryptoStream.Write(PlainTextBytes, 0, PlainTextBytes.Length);                     cryptoStream.FlushFinalBlock();                     CipherTextBytes = MemStream.ToArray();                 }             }         }         return Convert.ToBase64String(CipherTextBytes);     }     catch (Exception ex)     {         throw ex;     } }   /// <summary> /// Decrypts text given default values /// </summary> /// <param name="CipherText">/// <param name="Password">/// <param name="Salt">Password Salt value/// <param name="InitialVector">16 character string/// <returns></returns> public static string Decrypt(this string CipherText, string Password, string Salt, string InitialVector) {     return CipherText.Decrypt(Password, Salt, "SHA1", 72, InitialVector, 256); }   /// <summary> /// Decrypts a string given set of parameters /// </summary> /// <param name="CipherText">/// <param name="Password">/// <param name="Salt">/// <param name="HashAlgorithm">/// <param name="PasswordIterations">/// <param name="InitialVector">/// <param name="KeySize">/// <returns></returns> public static string Decrypt(this string CipherText, string Password, string Salt, string HashAlgorithm, int PasswordIterations, string InitialVector, int KeySize) {     try     {         byte[] CipherTextBytes = Convert.FromBase64String(CipherText);         byte[] PlainTextBytes;         int ByteCount;         using (ICryptoTransform Decryptor = CreateRijndael(Password, Salt, HashAlgorithm, PasswordIterations, InitialVector, KeySize, CryptoTransformDirection.Decrypt))         {             using (MemoryStream MemStream = new MemoryStream(CipherTextBytes))             {                 using (CryptoStream cryptoStream = new CryptoStream(MemStream, Decryptor, CryptoStreamMode.Read))                 {                     PlainTextBytes = new byte[CipherTextBytes.Length];                     ByteCount = cryptoStream.Read(PlainTextBytes, 0, PlainTextBytes.Length);                 }             }         }         return Encoding.UTF8.GetString(PlainTextBytes, 0, ByteCount);     }     catch (Exception ex)     {         //return String.Empty;         throw ex;     } }   /// <summary> /// Enumeration to define which direction the crypto is going /// </summary> public enum CryptoTransformDirection {     Encrypt,     Decrypt }   /// <summary> /// Gets a transform object which will perform the Encryption/Decryption /// </summary> /// <param name="Password">/// <param name="Salt">/// <param name="HashAlgorithm">/// <param name="PasswordIterations">/// <param name="InitialVector">/// <param name="KeySize">/// <param name="direction">Encrypt/Decrypt/// <returns></returns> public static ICryptoTransform CreateRijndael(string Password, string Salt, string HashAlgorithm, int PasswordIterations, string InitialVector, int KeySize, CryptoTransformDirection direction) {     byte[] InitialVectorBytes = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(InitialVector);     byte[] SaltValueBytes = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(Salt);     PasswordDeriveBytes DerivedPassword = new PasswordDeriveBytes(Password, SaltValueBytes, HashAlgorithm, PasswordIterations);     byte[] KeyBytes = DerivedPassword.GetBytes(KeySize / 8);     RijndaelManaged SymmetricKey = new RijndaelManaged();     SymmetricKey.Mode = CipherMode.CBC;     if (direction == CryptoTransformDirection.Decrypt)     {         return SymmetricKey.CreateDecryptor(KeyBytes, InitialVectorBytes);     }     else     {         return SymmetricKey.CreateEncryptor(KeyBytes, InitialVectorBytes);     }   }