Once you've done that, double-click IE7BlockerToolkit.EXE. The program will ask you for a location to extract the files to, and then quit. We're not talking about a slick user-interface here!

Navigate to the temp folder you just created. In it, you'll find four files. The file IE70BlockerHelp.htm is an interesting read, but it's very much oriented towards enterprise IT administrators.

The file you want is IE70Blocker.cmd. And now it gets to be more fun. Because you don't want to just double-click this program. Instead, you need to run it from the command line.

To do this, select Run from your Start menu. In the Run dialog, type in "cmd", as shown in Figure A.

FIGURE A

Let's open a command window. Click picture for a larger image.

You'll see the black and white command window. For many of you, this will be new. For the old-timers among us, this nearly identical to the old DOS A> prompt we haven't had to deal with for years.

Now, at the prompt, type "cd \temp" (without the quotes), as you can see in Figure B. This will move you to the C:\temp directory, which is where the new files are located. Don't forget to hit return at the end of each command.

FIGURE B

Navigate to the C:\temp directory. Click picture for a larger image.

You can see the files in question by typing DIR (remember DIR?), as shown in Figure C.

FIGURE C

It's old-school week here! Click picture for a larger image.

Now comes the key step. Type in "IE70Blocker.cmd /B" and hit return. You can see the result in Figure D.

FIGURE D

You'll see the note saying the IE7 deployment has been blocked. Fun! Click picture for a larger image.

If you later want to unblock deployment, simply type "IE70Blocker.cmd /U" in this same folder.

A happy little registry hack
All that happens when you go through this rigamarole is that a small registry entry is placed in your Windows registry, as you can see in Figure E.

FIGURE E

All that happens is a registry entry is installed. Click picture for a larger image.

The screenshot above is from the Windows Registry Editor. While you could just go into regedit and hack in the key DoNotAllowIE70, we don't recommend it. It's so incredibly easy to screw up your registry and one mistake can completely ruin your Windows install.

Wrap-up
We're honestly really annoyed that Microsoft didn't make this do-not-install flag easier to setup. After all, some mission critical applications won't be properly updated to IE7 and restoring IE6 is likely to be a near impossibility.

In any case, good luck!

Heather Wardell received her first Palm handheld in 1997 (from a boss who couldn't get the hang of Graffiti) and has never looked back. She worked in banking as a systems analyst for four years, and then moved into elementary education, teaching computers at a private elementary school for four years. Heather is now a full-time writer with two main specialties: articles that explain how a particular technology works, and short stories that usually involve technology run amok. You can reach her on the Web at http://www.heatherwardell.com.