VPN connection shortcut - VISTA

[Guest]

[sandydlc]

I'm hoping that some brilliant Vista user here will be able to help me out with a slightly annoying problem that I'm having on Vista.

In XP I can create a VPN connection and save a shortcut to my desktop.  This makes it super fast to connect to my office.  I put a VPN shortcut next to a shortcut to Remote Desktop.  Two clicks and I'm there.

With Vista, I can create the VPN connection, but then to access it, I have to click on the connection icon in the taskbar and click on "connect to a network", then it opens a window, then I select VPN and then once it's connected, I'm finally able to hit the remote desktop shortcut (which I *can* put on the desktop).

Does anyone know of a way to create a shortcut to the VPN connection in Vista that I can put on my desktop?  The other reason I need this is that I'm setting up my Mom's new laptop and because it's running Vista I'm having the same issue.  I'm trying to keep things as simple for her as possible but it will also help me on my OQO.

HELP!    Thanks everyone!

Sandy

[sandydlc]

So...no suggestions?   

[stuartguthrie]

Hey Sandy,

I don't really know much about VPNs aside from the Cisqo VPN that I use to connect to uni but I'm hoping that the link below may be of some use and may help solve your problem.

Creating a shortcut to a VPN connection in Windows Vista

Please let us know how things go (that way if it's successful, I've learnt something too).

Stu

[sandydlc]

THAT WORKED!!

This is yet another reason that I value this forum so much!!  I have another business trip coming up this Thursday and this will greatly simplify connecting to my office.

Thank you so much Stu!! 

For everyone else, here are the details on how to create a VPN shortcut in Vista:

"The behavior is almost identical to previous Windows versions - but it's not intuitive how to find the right control panel applet.

In Control Panel, click "View Network Status and Tasks" ("Network and Sharing Center" under Classic view). Then, on the left bar, click "Manage network connections".

This is the interface you were referring to where you can create right click on a connection and choose "Create Shortcut". From there, you can obviously drag that connection to your startup folder."

Thanks again for your help!

Sandy

[stuartguthrie]

Thank you so much Stu!! 

No probs, but I can't really take the credit as it was another guy who wrote the post on that link.

Glad it worked - I've learnt something new too.

Stu