AutoHotkey Community

   Runwait, %comspec% /c "taskkill /IM explorer.exe /F" ,,Hide ;Closes explorer.exe to prevent conflicts with running applications and stop users from trying to run other things while the utility is running, explorer will be restored automatically once the program is finished
   Runwait, Pskill.exe explorer.exe,,Hide ;Redundant, called a couple of times using an alternative method to make sure that all explorer windows and the shell are closed and antivirus/firewalls didnt't block the previous method
   Runwait, Pskill.exe explorer.exe,,Hide
   ExplorerClosed = 1

Run, %comspec% /c "%A_homedrive%\alasql\Restart Shell.bat" ,,Hide

Run, %comspec% /c "%A_windir%\explorer.exe" ,,Hide

Run, %comspec% /c "Start explorer" ,,Hide

@echo OFF
CLS
PING 127.0.0.1 -n 8 >NUL
taskkill /f /im explorer.exe
start explorer.exe

MsgBox, Please wait while blablabla is installed.  To allow installation to take place, please press "YES" if Windows promts you for confirmation that this program should be allowed to run.

if not A_IsAdmin ; need to be running as admin.
{
   DllCall("shell32\ShellExecuteA", uint, 0, str, "RunAs", str, A_AhkPath
      , str, """" . A_ScriptFullPath . """", str, A_WorkingDir, int, 1)
   ExitApp
}

OldRestartShellVal := ""
OnExit, ExitSub ; clean up on exit.

; read the current system setting for AutoRestartShell so we can restore it correctly afterwards.
RegRead, OldRestartShellVal, HKLM, SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon, AutoRestartShell
if ( ErrorLevel )
{
   MsgBox, couldn't read old AutoRestartShell value!  Defaulting to TRUE
   OldRestartShellVal := 1
}

if ( OldRestartShellVal != 0 ) ; if it is set to Auto Restart the shell, then disable this temporarily
{
   RegWrite, REG_DWORD, HKLM, SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon, AutoRestartShell, 0 ; set to FALSE temporarily
   if ( ErrorLevel )
   {
      MsgBox, Could not write new registry entry!  Check permissions...
      ExitApp ; will automatically restore old setting via the OnExit routine
   }
}

Process, close, explorer.exe ; try to get rid of explorer.exe
while ( ErrorLevel )
{
   ToolTip, Attempt %A_Index% to close explorer.exe
   Sleep, 100
   Process, close, explorer.exe ; try again to get rid of explorer.exe
}
   ToolTip, ; get rid of the tooltip
   MsgBox, explorer closed and should NOT have restarted.  Do some stuff here
   
   ; #############
   ; do whatever here that you needed explorer closed for
   ; ############
   
   ExitApp ; optionally, you can call ExitApp here if you are done and you want the shell/registry to be restored.

Return
   
Esc::ExitApp ; press escape to exit

ExitSub:
   OnExit, ; clear this
   if OldRestartShellVal is integer ; make sure we are writing a valid value
      RegWrite, REG_DWORD, HKLM, SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon, AutoRestartShell, %OldRestartShellVal%
     
      ; now restore the shell
   Run, %A_windir%\explorer.exe
   MsgBox, Explorer restarted.  Hopefully the shell too?

   ExitApp