Those tiles are limited to Modern UI apps. It's possible for such an app to launch normal desktop applications, so all that's needed is to make a simple app that launches the proper desktop application and customize that app's tile.
However, making an app for each shortcut may be a bit annoying. Luckily, one app can have multiple tiles, so called Secondary Tiles. So what's needed is an app that can make custom tiles that launch different programs.
Even more luckily, someone has begun making such a program. It's called OblyTile. This will allow you to create cool looking tiles for non-Modern UI apps (desktop shortcuts).
Features:
- A tile can point to a program, file, URL etc. (with optional arguments)
- Custom background color.
- Custom icon/image.
- Custom small image.
- Custom text (or no text) on the tile.
HOW-TO
Create an PNG image that will cover the entire tile. The size should be 120x120px. This image can have transparency (then the tile's background color will show). Optionally, also create a small version of the image, 30x30px.
My icons for a Firefox icon: small - big
They are white and transparent, so a bit hard to see. On grey background:
Run the OblyTile program.
Fill inn the name of the program, browse for the .exe file (or what you want) and select the two images. Then select a background color for your tile. Example:
This can also be done through command line / batch scripts:
start ob.exe "Firefox" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe" "" "fx_big.png" "fx_small.png" #f58d00 show
After doing this with a few tiles (Mail&Desktop tiles are not custom):
And the small image:
To remove a tile, just right click it and select Unpin from start
My icon are from this icon pack, but there's no need to go for the same minimalistic style as I did.
Best Answer
Shortcuts to Modern apps
A little hacking around (and re-enforced by this article) led me to the following:
All Modern UI Programs are stored in the same place:
C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\(found out by doing an open file location from the task manager on a Modern UI app).Since it all Modern UI apps are stored there, there is nothing that prevents windows from simply assuming that everything in that folder is in fact a modern UI application, and follows that convention.
The article I linked to above seems to support this conclusion.
In short, there are no shortcuts to Modern UI apps, it just enumerates the contents inside
C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\