keyboard shortcut to toggle hidden files

A web search for this suggests Alt-V H H - this does work, but ignores super hidden files. Setting the appropriate registry entries and refreshing with F5 also works, but doesn't translate well into a script. The issue is sending F5 to refresh the view. It can be done but you may have to allow time delays. @LesFerch includes this function in his RightClickTools. I checked his source code to see if he has a better way of doing this. He does for windows 11 (and current versions of windows 10).

RightClickTools performs all its functions by running the RightClickTools.exe with the appropriate parameter. For toggling hidden files:

RightClickTools.exe /showhide

Downloading the zip file from https://github.com/LesFerch/RightClickTools/releases/download/1.2.0/RightClickTools.zip . unblocking it and extracting the exe, shows that it works nicely. Although it shouldn't be too difficult to create a smaller program with only that function, I don't think it would work any better.
So, to get a decent keyboard shortcut to toggle hidden files, create a shortcut file for RightClickTools.exe with the /showhide parameter, and set the shortcut key to taste. I used 'Toggle Hidden' as the shortcut name and Ctrl + Shift + H for the shortcut key. The shortcut needs to be in a suitable folder. I used the user start menu. You can find this from shell:programs in the run box.
I've not installed RightClickTools, but this would work just as well if you have.

Mike

Hello Mike,

You might see if the context menu added by the tutorial below may work for you for this.

Brink said:

You might see if the context menu added by the tutorial below may work for you for this.

Add Hidden items Context Menu in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to add a custom Hidden items context menu to make it easy to hide/unhide selected files/folders and hide/show hidden items on demand in Windows 10 and Windows 11. Hidden files, folders, and drives do not show by default in Windows. Hidden files, folders, and...

www.elevenforum.com

Click to expand...

This isn't really relevant, but thanks. Indeed the technique for showing super hidden files has the considerable disadvantage of closing all your explorer windows. Whereas the Les Ferch method doesn't.

My initial post was simply to suggest a way of using a keyboard shortcut to toggle hidden files, in case anyone else might find it helpful. I prefer that to using the context menu.

Mike

Skeptic Mike said:

This isn't really relevant, but thanks. Indeed the technique for showing super hidden files has the considerable disadvantage of closing all your explorer windows. Whereas the Les Ferch method doesn't.

My initial post was simply to suggest a way of using a keyboard shortcut to toggle hidden files, in case anyone else might find it helpful. I prefer that to using the context menu.

Mike

Click to expand...

The Hide/Show hidden items menu item should toggle on/off without restarting explorer.

2 AHK compiled to EXE

one is Ctrl + F2 to show all hidden and system protected files

other is just double click to show all hidden and system protected files. threw this one in here so you can assign it to whatever hotkey fits your system setup best.