UAC behavior (administrator vs power user)

Alright, there is some definite confusion going on.

C:\Program Files is not special in that applications require UAC to access it. The reason UAC asks for elevation, is because you're trying to modify files in a folder that is ACL'd to Users:R. You never want to be asked for elevation to Program Files? Set the ACL to Users:F.

C:\Games is not special or magical in any way. Since your user created the directory, the default ACL is Owner:F. Another user, trying to modify that folder, would probably get a UAC prompt.

I suggest you read up on NTFS and Default Permissions and the CACL.EXE tool. All UAC is doing is asking do you want to do something the ACL at your user level denies.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
 
I find it interesting that Blizzard was brought up in this thread. My sister's computer has one primary purpose - WOW. She's not exactly computer savvy, neither is her husband who built the damned thing. With everything installed with the default setup, every time she launches WOW she gets a UAC prompt.

I don't mean the inability to run the game without UAC prompt being the reason Blizzard moved the game to the user folder, I meant the inability to use addons because they get locked out due to lacking administrative access to Program Files.

You can get around the UAC prompt starting up the game by creating an administrative shortcut. Rightclick the shortcut, and in the Shortcut tab, click Advanced,and check "run as administrator".
 
Ok, that clarifies things somewhat. What you need to realize is that - because most of us understand that there's no Administrator account - when you stated in your OP:

Out of habit, as I'm sure many other folks do too, I run Windows with my primary account enabled as an administrator.

is and will more than likely be interpreted as "I've modified the Registry so my normal user account runs with higher privileges" - at least that's how I interpreted it, and reading through the posts again tells me perhaps others thought the same thing. So now that's cleared up: you're using the defaults from the installation and getting confused with the "Computer Administrator" thing.

If there's only one account on the machine, it will always be called "Computer Administrator" by default, but the title doesn't imply the actual "power" of being a true Administrator because as I've pointed out such an account with such privileges simply doesn't exist anymore. I hope that's now crystal clear; it's just a title on the account meaning the type since it's not Limited User or Power User, and it's the only account so, again, by default it'll be titled "Computer Administrator."

I think the best way to look at this and approach it is just to stop using that word Administrator, period, because no such thing exists anymore, at least not as a permanent setting. You're allowed to elevate a process to "Administrator" level to execute it but that only applies to that one app or process and not to everything that happens under that particular account.

Phew... now that that's done, moving on...

Windows 7 by default does not put UAC on the highest level. In Windows 7 it has 4 levels on the slider, which I'll label as 1-2-3-4 from the top down. By default, Windows 7 should be showing 2 (second notch down) as the default, not 1 which would be the the most strict. This is what your UAC control slider should look like and it's even noted that it's the "Default" for Windows 7:

uac.jpg


If you're absolutely 100% sure it's at the highest ("Always notify") then you need to back it down a notch - if it did become set to the highest by default, something again isn't quite right here and I can't figure out particularly what it might be.

As for why some of your apps or games are showing the shield requiring elevation, I couldn't even begin to say why...
 
You can get around the UAC prompt starting up the game by creating an administrative shortcut. Rightclick the shortcut, and in the Shortcut tab, click Advanced,and check "run as administrator".

Running an app with such an option enabled always causes the prompt to appear, yanno... :D Elevation to that level or privilege is precisely what triggers the prompt in the first place.
 
Sorry for the confusion. When I said I run enabled as an ... that word we're not using anymore... I meant that the default setting was left alone, and the single account was considered to have more access than a standard user would.

Okay, so in going back and checking, my primary account has UAC set like this:
2e1du2w.png

The second account (the one I made last night) has UAC set like this:
73j6uh.png


Neither of these are changed from the way they started. Apologies for the further confusion. One of the downsides of posting on a forum away from home when the PC in question is at home.

I think I just figured something else out too. When I run Warhammer, the UAC prompt has a blue border and indicates a known publisher (Electronic Arts). When I run Everquest 2, the UAC prompt has a yellow border and indicates an unknown publisher. Not sure how that is relevant but it's a discovery at least. No screenshots, of course, because of screen dimming.
 
Running an app with such an option enabled always causes the prompt to appear, yanno... :D Elevation to that level or privilege is precisely what triggers the prompt in the first place.

Ah well, it's just a shortcut to launcher.exe :p

I don't do this on anything else since only this game prompts UAC. Sure, it takes all of 0.5 seconds to hit ok, but meh :-P
 
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