Bulk unblock files in Windows 7

When you download files from unsafe sources like the internet, Windows will helpfully block those files to protect you.
I find that one of the most annoying and unusable feature in Windows 7.
Not because I don’t want to be safe, I do, but that feature gets in my way more often than not.
Usually, I download Visual Studio solutions with the usual libs folder, or binaries I trust. My download pattern is to let my browser open the zip file, extract all files from there, and start digging.
At this point I have all forgotten about the download, the location of the download folder, or worse, the temp folder. So when I now is prohibited by Windows to do my work, I get annoyed because there are no simple way to unblock all files in a directory tree.'
Here’s a way to make life easier:

• Download  Streams.
• Remember to unblock the zip file.
• Unzip and copy streams.exe to \Windows\System32 or any other directory in your path environment variable.

Now we are ready for the manual option:

• Hold down Shift and right-click the blocked folder.
• Select “Open command window here”
• Execute the following command “streams -s -d *.*”

For the automatic option, we need to modify the registry:

• Create a new text file and rename it to something like “unblock-files-in-here.reg”.
• Paste in the text below
• Run the file.
• Right-click a file and select “Unblock file”
• Or right-click a folder and select “Unblock files in here”

Registry script:

1. Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00  
2.  
3. [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\*\shell\unblockfile]  
4. @="Unblock file"  
5.  
6. [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\*\shell\unblockfile\command]  
7. @="cmd /c streams -d \"%1\""  
8.  
9. [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\unblockfilesinhere]  
10. @="Unblock files in here"  
11.  
12. [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\unblockfilesinhere\command]  
13. @="cmd /c streams.exe -d -s \"%1\""  

Resources:

• http://elijahmanor.com/webdevdotnet/post/Recursively-Unblock-Assemblies-with-Streams.aspx
• http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897440.aspx
• http://superuser.com/questions/110362/shell-extension-to-unblock-downloaded-files