Create a Shortcut that Quits Every Running Windows Program Weve featured programs that close down non-essential Windows apps before, as well as ways to kill those regularly problematic apps. If youd rather not install extra software, though, heres a way to create your own desktop shortcut to kill all running apps. The process is pretty easy, though not for the faint of heart�this involves a command prompt command that will kill a whole bunch of programs, so make sure you know what youre doing before you start clicking away. In a nutshell, to create the shortcut, all you need to do is right-click on the desktop and hit New Shortcut. Copy and paste the following command into the popup box: taskkill /F /FI "USERNAME eq whitsongordon" /FI "IMAGENAME ne explorer.exe" /FI "IMAGENAME ne dwm.exe" Be sure to change whitsongordon to your Windows username. Then, give it a cool icon (the above screenshot uses an icon contained in C:WindowsSystem32imageres.dll icon)...