The example has some errors.
The registry path doesn't use raw string, which is necessary to prevent accidental escaping.
Instead of using
os.path...., use
pathlib.Path. I don't know why someone wrote 2021 a tutorial with code which was outdated for years since 2021.
You don't need to close the registry. OpenKey returns an object, which has support for context manager.
The naming was not Pythonic. Use PascalCase for classes. For functions lower case and word split by
_.
autostart.py
from winreg import HKEY_CURRENT_USER, OpenKey, KEY_ALL_ACCESS, SetValueEx, REG_SZ
from pathlib import Path
def add_to_registry(name : str, script: Path | str):
script = Path(script)
quoted_script = f'"py.exe {script}"'
if not script.exists():
raise ValueError(f"Script '{script}' does not exist")
# use raw string to avoid unwanted escaping
# e.g. \r, \n, \b, \t are Escape Sequences interpreted
sub_key = r"Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run"
# OpenKey returns winreg.PyHKEY object
# which supports context manager
# it closes the registry before leaving the
# block
with OpenKey(
key=HKEY_CURRENT_USER,
sub_key=sub_key,
access=KEY_ALL_ACCESS,
) as registry:
SetValueEx(registry, name,0, REG_SZ, quoted_script)
if __name__=="__main__":
add_to_registry("TEST", Path.home().joinpath("AppData", "Local", "script.py"))The test script:
Path: C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Local\script.py
from datetime import datetime as DateTime
from pathlib import Path
with Path.home().joinpath("Desktop", "time.txt").open("w") as fd:
fd.write(DateTime.now().isoformat())
fd.write("\n")This creates a file named time.txt on your Desktop.
If you want to hide the window during running the code, further investigation is required.
I don't use Widows, so my knowledge is limited.
