I’m currently working in a client’s office, on an extremely locked-down Windows 7 PC. As usual, I want to change to the dvorak keyboard layout, which is my standard. However, the environment on the computer is reset every couple of days, which wipes out my keyboard setting.

So I started looking for a way to change it through a powershell script. Unfortunately, Windows 7 only has an extremely limited version of powershell. But I was able to find a way to change it using an xml script at these two sites:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/goglobal/bb964650?f=255&mspperror=-2147217396#eyb

https://superuser.com/questions/395818/how-to-change-keyboard-layout-via-command-line-cmd-exe-on-windows-xp-7

Combining them both together, I put together the following xml file:

<gs:GlobalizationServices xmlns:gs="urn:longhornGlobalizationUnattend">

<gs:UserList>
<gs:User UserID="Current"/>
</gs:UserList>

<gs:InputPreferences>

<!-- Add Dvorak -->
<gs:InputLanguageID Action="add" ID="0409:00010409"/>

<!-- Remove US default-->
<gs:InputLanguageID Action="remove" ID="0409:00000409"/>

</gs:InputPreferences>
</gs:GlobalizationServices>

The trickiest part was finding the code for the dvorak keyboard, which is 0409:00010409

The code to execute the xml file is:

control intl.cpl,, /f:"Desktop\changekeyboard.xml"

Which I then put into a .bat file which I keep on the desktop. So, whenever, the keyboard changes, I just double-click the bat file, and the keyboard is fixed again, and I end up with the keyboards as so: