Running windows commands from a webpage.

Is there anyway to run windows command from a webpage. Not for malicous purposes. Basically I have built a system in php that allows my employees to track case progress. Its all done online thorugh mysql and php. I want them to be able to click a button that will open something like 'explorer x:\mydocs\client1\'.

I think its probably not possible for security reasons but does anybody know of any javascript that may do this??

In fact I just figure it out in IE, its a simple as linking to 'file://x:\clients files'. Does anybody know of a method that may work in firefox.

As long as the people viewing the page are at the location and on the network where the server is you just call the file up. If the browser has the plug in to handle the file then it will work, basically it sounds like you need an Intranet solution.

If thats not the case then you are probably better off using a non web based application and using an extranet with VPN tunnellin gif the people using the system are not at the location.

Further to this, if certain browser settings are turned on you can run an activeX application that can execute code.

I think the setting in IE is Allow Active Content to run and you need Java installed. I have used a web conferencing set up like this that allows control over the users machine.

Be a bit more specific and I will see if I can provide a more definitive answer. This is probably more of a forums.devshed.com question though, try there.

Why do you need to access anything via Windows if the application is all in PHP/MySQL? It seems a lot portable and safe to just use PHP to access whatever it is your after. It is very simple to use PHP the read the files in a directory and make them available for download.

What exactly are you wanting to accomplish?

And in short, as long as your user is willing to install an ActiveX component or Java Applet, you can do just about anything you want on their machine. But you will also be opening them up to all kinds of security issues if you are not very careful with the application. In general, it is not a good way to go in my opinion.