UAC Inconsistencies Among Vista Machines?

Hi -

I have to distribute a batch file to many Vista and XP users in our
organization, which will dump a 16 bit app onto the local hard drive and
create shortcuts to it on the Desktop and Start Menu. I would prefer that
the program folder be copied to Program Files and that a shortcut be copied
to the %AllUsersProfile% Desktop and Start Menu. All of the users will be
installing it on their personally owned laptops so they almost certainly will
have Admin rights.

The problem is that when I tried this on a couple of computers using an
account with Admin rights, it worked like a charm. But when I tried it on a
third, I found that it prompted for elevation. (All of these machines have
UAC turned on.) I don't think there is a way to elevate within a batch file,
so I tried right clicking the batch file and choosing "Run as Administrator".
Then because it was running under a different account, I lost my working
directory and the batch file was not able to find the files it needed to
copy. (I can't use an absolute path to the source files in the batch file,
since I can't assume the directory that users will be running this from.) I
ended up changing the batch file so that everything was copied to the user's
own profile, since I don't know how many other Vista machines will have this
same problem.

Can someone explain why I would be prompted to elevate when trying to copy
these files on some machine but not others? I'm not sure what I'm missing.

Thanks.

It may be obvious, but I don't think I made it clear that all of these
problem machines are running Vista. The XP ones worked fine, though I had to
use a different batch file altogether.

"Baboon" wrote:

> Hi -
>
> I have to distribute a batch file to many Vista and XP users in our
> organization, which will dump a 16 bit app onto the local hard drive and
> create shortcuts to it on the Desktop and Start Menu. I would prefer that
> the program folder be copied to Program Files and that a shortcut be copied
> to the %AllUsersProfile% Desktop and Start Menu. All of the users will be
> installing it on their personally owned laptops so they almost certainly will
> have Admin rights.
>
> The problem is that when I tried this on a couple of computers using an
> account with Admin rights, it worked like a charm. But when I tried it on a
> third, I found that it prompted for elevation. (All of these machines have
> UAC turned on.) I don't think there is a way to elevate within a batch file,
> so I tried right clicking the batch file and choosing "Run as Administrator".
> Then because it was running under a different account, I lost my working
> directory and the batch file was not able to find the files it needed to
> copy. (I can't use an absolute path to the source files in the batch file,
> since I can't assume the directory that users will be running this from.) I
> ended up changing the batch file so that everything was copied to the user's
> own profile, since I don't know how many other Vista machines will have this
> same problem.
>
> Can someone explain why I would be prompted to elevate when trying to copy
> these files on some machine but not others? I'm not sure what I'm missing.
>
> Thanks.

In Vista, c:\Program Files is a protected system area. Directly writing
files here is going to give some results that you might not find to your
liking. Note that this directory is owned by 'Trusted Installer'. Generally
I have found that you can create subdirectories and store files, but you
cannot 'change' them as expected. instead 'shadow' copies of the changes are
saved and used in individual user areas.

Michael


"Baboon" <baboon@news.postalias> wrote in message
news:4AAFB845-5536-4F87-AA4A-FD357679C8E6@microsoft.com...

> It may be obvious, but I don't think I made it clear that all of these
> problem machines are running Vista. The XP ones worked fine, though I had
> to
> use a different batch file altogether.
>
> "Baboon" wrote:
>

Hello,

Thank you for using newsgroup!

From your post, I'd like to thanks for Michael's explanation.

Thanks & Regards,

Ken Zhao

Microsoft Online Support
Microsoft Global Technical Support Center

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--------------------
| From: "Michael" <mexxwalraven@verson.net>
| References: <3BD003E9-3C01-42FD-A261-505E7699006A@microsoft.com>
<4AAFB845-5536-4F87-AA4A-FD357679C8E6@microsoft.com>
| In-Reply-To: <4AAFB845-5536-4F87-AA4A-FD357679C8E6@microsoft.com>
| Subject: Re: UAC Inconsistencies Among Vista Machines?
| Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2007 00:28:52 -0400
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|
| In Vista, c:\Program Files is a protected system area. Directly writing
| files here is going to give some results that you might not find to your
| liking. Note that this directory is owned by 'Trusted Installer'.
Generally
| I have found that you can create subdirectories and store files, but you
| cannot 'change' them as expected. instead 'shadow' copies of the changes
are
| saved and used in individual user areas.
|
| Michael
|
|
| "Baboon" <baboon@news.postalias> wrote in message
| news:4AAFB845-5536-4F87-AA4A-FD357679C8E6@microsoft.com...
| > It may be obvious, but I don't think I made it clear that all of these
| > problem machines are running Vista. The XP ones worked fine, though I
had
| > to
| > use a different batch file altogether.
| >
| > "Baboon" wrote:
| >
| >> Hi -
| >>
| >> I have to distribute a batch file to many Vista and XP users in our
| >> organization, which will dump a 16 bit app onto the local hard drive
and
| >> create shortcuts to it on the Desktop and Start Menu. I would prefer
| >> that
| >> the program folder be copied to Program Files and that a shortcut be
| >> copied
| >> to the %AllUsersProfile% Desktop and Start Menu. All of the users
will
| >> be
| >> installing it on their personally owned laptops so they almost
certainly
| >> will
| >> have Admin rights.
| >>
| >> The problem is that when I tried this on a couple of computers using an
| >> account with Admin rights, it worked like a charm. But when I tried
it
| >> on a
| >> third, I found that it prompted for elevation. (All of these machines
| >> have
| >> UAC turned on.) I don't think there is a way to elevate within a
batch
| >> file,
| >> so I tried right clicking the batch file and choosing "Run as
| >> Administrator".
| >> Then because it was running under a different account, I lost my
working
| >> directory and the batch file was not able to find the files it needed
to
| >> copy. (I can't use an absolute path to the source files in the batch
| >> file,
| >> since I can't assume the directory that users will be running this
from.)
| >> I
| >> ended up changing the batch file so that everything was copied to the
| >> user's
| >> own profile, since I don't know how many other Vista machines will
have
| >> this
| >> same problem.
| >>
| >> Can someone explain why I would be prompted to elevate when trying to
| >> copy
| >> these files on some machine but not others? I'm not sure what I'm
| >> missing.
| >>
| >> Thanks.
|
|

Thanks for the response.

You said:
"you can create subdirectories and store files, but you
cannot 'change' them as expected"
The batch file was only trying to create a subdirectory in Program Files.

It also was't able to create shortcuts in %AllUsersProfile%.

If I tried to do either of these things manually under the same admin
account that was running the batch file, I succeeded, but I was asked to
elevate on the problem machines only.

I can't understand that given several machines that all had UAC enabled,
some had this behavior and others worked just fine. Group Policy is not a
factor, for one thing.

Regards.

"Michael" wrote:

> In Vista, c:\Program Files is a protected system area. Directly writing
> files here is going to give some results that you might not find to your
> liking. Note that this directory is owned by 'Trusted Installer'. Generally
> I have found that you can create subdirectories and store files, but you
> cannot 'change' them as expected. instead 'shadow' copies of the changes are
> saved and used in individual user areas.
>
> Michael
>
>
> "Baboon" <baboon@news.postalias> wrote in message
> news:4AAFB845-5536-4F87-AA4A-FD357679C8E6@microsoft.com...

>