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Serge · Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 1:19 am Post subject: xp rights and privileges

hi all,

i need help with administrator rights and privileges under xp

someone has loaded my program Canary onto their computer and sent me this message to explain what the problem is

jules · Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 8:10 am Post subject:

This looks like the same error Skit (I think it was) had. Apparently the user doesn't have read rights to the registry value that contains the internet explorer version number. I don't know how you can fix this.

Serge · Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 8:41 am Post subject:

thanks for that jules

i will do a search of the forum in the hope of finding his post - skit, if that was you, did you find a work around?

serge

Skit3000 · Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 3:02 pm Post subject:

I can't remember I ever have had this error. I tried searching for it on the fora, but couldn't find a thing... Rolling Eyes

Serge · Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 3:16 pm Post subject:

hi skit,

it was jan who first raised the issue and i found his post - i asked him if he found out more about it and said that he used vdssurfx.dll to get around the problem

sorry for the bother Crying or Very sad

serge

Skit3000 · Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 6:45 am Post subject:

No problemo... Smile

jules · Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 8:11 am Post subject:

Serge · Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 8:58 am Post subject:

no probs jules

serge

Serge · Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 2:24 am Post subject:

hi all,

i have changed my code so that i now use vdssurfx.dll and my customer says that it all works very well - thanks for that tip Smile

however, he has come across another problem that has to do with what registry root key my program can access under xp

the problem is: when he logged in as an admin, he set up all the settings he wanted and password

when he then logged in as a user, my program did not "see" his previous settings and password and wrote the default one to the registry and so had to start again with the settings and password

my program is set to save the information in the current user root key which i understood all users of xp had access to

if that is the case, why is this happening and where in the registry can i save an admin's settings so that all users who run my program are subject to the same settings?

thanks in advance

serge

CodeScript · Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 2:30 am Post subject:

Serge · Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 2:50 am Post subject:

thanks codescript - will look into that Smile

serge

jules · Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 10:19 am Post subject:

Really, if you are developing programs to release to the world in general, you have to test them under non-administrative users and even under different versions of Windows, and not just hope that they will work.

You are quite lucky to have a user who will work with you and give you feedback on the problems. Most people will just delete a program that doesn't work properly, and you may not find out why no-one is registering it for months.

You should also test the programs on a computer where VDS has never been installed. I had one program that would never work because I forgot to include one VDS extension DLL in the setup, and it was several months before anyone told me! Of course, the DLL was already on all my computers, so I never noticed the mistake.

PGWARE · **Web Host** Joined: 29 Dec 2001 Posts: 1564

You should be able to READ from HKLM just about any registry key. Logged in as a limited user you will NOT be able to write to HKLM or HKR.

Thus for each user that runs your software (each different Windows user logged in) you should write custom settings for them in the HKCU registry root.

Obviously you can use both HKCU and HKLM for an admin user. Preferably you should only store important software settings in HKLM such as registration serial (if required) so all users can run the software registered, program start up mode (if it starts up with windows) and other settings that you do not want normal limited users the ability to change.

Each different Windows user has a unique HKCU, it is not the same and is not shared. Only HKLM & HKR is shared throughout the entire computer and is protected (default) from being written to unless logged in as a admin account.

One easy way to check if the software is running under and admin or limited user account is simply to write to the HKLM registry and see if the value was written by using a @regread right after the write. Obviously if the value was written you are 'probably' under an admin account, if the value did not change you are logged into a limited user account.

Serge · Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 3:45 pm Post subject:

jules,

i agree about properly testing software before releasing it and i generally thoroughly test my programs before i release them but there is only so much testing that one can do eg. i can test under windows 98se and xp but not under every other flavour of windows and i would rather give up programming than have to spend $$$ on windows versions just so i can test that my programs all run under every version of windows

the other testing problem i have is user access as i know nothing about it under xp and am not sure where to go to find just the information i need

i have come across the same problem you mentioned with files missing and getting around that is also a problem when you only have access to your home computers where you have vds running to write code and to test it and you can't really uninstall vds every time you want to test a program

as i said, there is only so much testing you can do Smile

add to that the problem that came up with the browser element checking the version number before loading into memory, i spend considerable time writing code that made my program depend on that in good faith that the browser would reliably work under xp's user restrictions only to find that my work was in vain because there was a "bug" or problem with it - not something i could foresee unless i need to test all the elements of vds under every possible situation that a user faces when running my program

sorry about this but there is only so much you can do to test a program

pgware,

thanks for your help - will read your comments very carefully to try and learn about this whole user and rights issues under xp

serge

jules · Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2005 7:53 am Post subject:

I agree with you to a great extent, Serge. I have almost come to the point that I am giving up writing any more programs for general release because it is impossible to write a program that will run perfectly on every computer. Either that, or you have to adopt the attitude that if someone finds your program won't run on their computer, you just have to reply "bad luck, you're one of the unlucky ones."

My programs that use the browser element work perfectly fine under a non-administrative user here. So it's not a problem that would have come to light during my own testing of the browser element, and I'm as much in the dark about the reason for it as you are.