Making a program automatically start with admin rights...possible?

Hey, I have a bit of a special case on my hands.

On my family system I'm running W7 Professional with 6 user accounts. (one for each family member)

All accounts are limited save for one (my stepmom, which I also have access to) and UAC is enabled. I set up the machine myself, and perform all maintenance and tech support on the system, including software installation.

When the machine had windows XP, I had to create a additional administrator account for my little brothers in order for them to play their MMO games...they won't run in standard mode.

I know about going into compatibility mode, but that forces the UAC prompt to appear at launching the game...something I want to avoid for obvious reasons (my little brothers will end up knowing the admin password...) and I would rather not make them an adminstrator...again for obvious reasons..

Any suggestions?

Ricky.

 

Would making a Task Scheduler shortcut work?

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/window-on-windows/?p=730

 

Interesting, I'll have to try this...it sucks that I'm doing this via remote but oh well

 

right click the program icon, get into the compatibility tab, you should see a pile of selections including admin mode. if you can't see a comparability tab chances are that you are not an admin user or that the filesystem settings are blocking some settings. There is also a change settings for all users button but that's the BFH of last resort.

there is also the program compatibility wizard which is the preferred method.

it's a BAD IDEA to blindly set executables to run as admin all the time especially for non-trusted users. Kind of like the noob (stoopid) Unix user who does a chmod 777 on all of their files.

 

Problem is that the OP didn't want to make the users an Administrator. All suggestions mentioned and anything I can think of requires you to be an Administrator. No help here.

 

The Task Scheduler shortcut trick should do EXACTLY what the OP wants.

Gary

 

Exactly, I don't want them to have administrator access. The task scheduler trick mentioned earlier will work though.

Great! I just now have to find time between studying to try it out!

 

It will work, but it is the entirely wrong approach to go about solving your problem. Depending on how this game works, this can potentially still open up huge gaping security holes in your system.

All you need to do to allow those kids to run their games is to change permissions on the installation folder of these games. Obviously the games were coded by some incompetents, so that they insist on writing/modifying files in system areas. In almost all cases, such games are simple-minded enough so that adding "Modify" permissions to "Users" in the security tab of the Properties context menu of the installation folder of the game will solve the problem, and allow the kids to run the game without administrative privileges.

In rare cases (for games anyway), the program may also attempt to write in system areas of the registry (typically HKLM\Software), in which case you would have to modify permissions of the approriate sub-hierarchy in the registry as well.

P.S.: I have run all of my Windows systems since Win2K as a limited user (so that's for about ten years now), and I have never encountered a program, game or otherwise, that could not be run perfectly fine by modifying a few permissions. Like I said above, games are usually simple to fix. Interestingly enough, at least a few years go, expensive CAD and engineering software, on the other hand, sometimes required a fair amount of registry wizardry...

 

Yeah this stuff is pretty shoddily developed..but its "what the kids are playing " I'll look into your permissions thing first, then try the task scheduler work around.

 

If "Modify" permissions are not sufficient, just give Users full permissions to the game installation folders. Nine out of ten cases that should do the trick.

 

I did it to the game company's folder in the Program Files folder but no dice, my brother report's.

I'll try modifying the permissions for the registry next

 

Ya, what he said. It can be found here.

Although for me, it doesn't work with some games (Just Cause 2), but it will work for others (Diablo 2).