Windows UAC Control

By jbrooksuk
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jbrooksuk

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Hey all,

We all know how annoying Windows UAC is, and how annoying it is to turn it off, so may I introduce to you, Windows UAC Control.

Windows UAC Control presents you with two buttons, On/Off. Obviously doing what they say.

screenshot.png

The download is available here.

Note: Windows UAC Control still requires a restart after changing a setting. This is just Windows behaviour.

Regards,

James

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https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/790784-windows-uac-control/
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jbrooksuk

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in windows 7 it is not annoying and you can turn it off or on in vista but then in window s7 ya can silent it so why bother

You're right, you can turn it off in Windows 7, but still, a quick solution is always nice.

Why bother? Because this method is faster. In Windows itself you need to go to Control Panel etc etc, with this, you run and change the setting. Done.

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soumyasch

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An entire app just to save, what, three keystrokes and mouse clicks (Start -> Control Panel -> type UAC -> Turn UAC on or off) for an operation that you will do once in perhaps an entire month seems kinda pointless.

It would have been better if it did other things - like, instead of a just turn on/off, why not snooze for a specific period? Or a notification area widget/desktop gadget instead of a separate window?

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jbrooksuk

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No point when there is TweakUAC (which doesn't need a restart).

TweakUAC-main-screen.png

I wonder how that works (with no restart).

An entire app just to save, what, three keystrokes and mouse clicks (Start -> Control Panel -> type UAC -> Turn UAC on or off) for an operation that you will do once in perhaps an entire month seems kinda pointless.

It would have been better if it did other things - like, instead of a just turn on/off, why not snooze for a specific period? Or a notification area widget/desktop gadget instead of a separate window?

Snooze for what for a period? Notification widget to display what?

I wonder how that works (with no restart).

This is how. It just disables the prompts for Admin users by the looks of it.

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soumyasch

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Snooze for what for a period? Notification widget to display what?

I just gave some pointers, didn't write the entire spec!

Anyways, you can present a slider to the user to select the snooze duration.

And instead of a separate application window, use a notiification area widget to choose between the various states of UAC (silent, verbose and snoozed) much like the power plan selection widget works. Or use a desktop gadget for the same. Normally that will just show the UAC status with buttons to switch states. And when snoozed, a timer, perhaps? IMO, rather than opening an app to do this, if it were already present in some unobtrusive way as gadget or hidden in notification area, it would be better in terms of usability.

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jbrooksuk

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I just gave some pointers, didn't write the entire spec!

Anyways, you can present a slider to the user to select the snooze duration.

And instead of a separate application window, use a notiification area widget to choose between the various states of UAC (silent, verbose and snoozed) much like the power plan selection widget works. Or use a desktop gadget for the same. Normally that will just show the UAC status with buttons to switch states. And when snoozed, a timer, perhaps? IMO, rather than opening an app to do this, if it were already present in some unobtrusive way as gadget or hidden in notification area, it would be better in terms of usability.

Now you're just talking in terms of HCI (Human Computer Interaction), all you're doing is tricking the user into thinking it's already part of the system - which is good!

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Salty Wagyu

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An entire app just to save, what, three keystrokes and mouse clicks (Start -> Control Panel -> type UAC -> Turn UAC on or off) for an operation that you will do once in perhaps an entire month seems kinda pointless.

Once a month? I was trying 7 in a dual boot alongside XP the other day and had UAC prompts like 10+ times in a session, it prompts every time i start cpu-z or my evga precision app. Shouldn't UAC at least remember the programs I've accepted cos its annoying as hell.

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jbrooksuk

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Want to write us a sandboxing program to replace the one that you're disabling with this program?

Erm, no. Sandboxing requires a lot of experience with memory allocations and ASM.

Once a month? I was trying 7 in a dual boot alongside XP the other day and had UAC prompts like 10+ times in a session, it prompts every time i start cpu-z or my evga precision app. Shouldn't UAC at least remember the programs I've accepted cos its annoying as hell.

I thought all accepted programs were stored in the registry?

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Hey all,

We all know how annoying Windows UAC is, and how annoying it is to turn it off,

Ah? is NOT annoying at all, besides in Windows 7 turning off UAC is the easiest thing in the world, In fact what is annoying to me is the stupid idea of getting less protected by turning UAC OFF, you can even make it silent for god's sake!

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jbrooksuk

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Ah? is NOT annoying at all, besides in Windows 7 turning off UAC is the easiest thing in the world, In fact what is annoying to me is the stupid idea of turning UAC OFF, you can even make it silent for god's sake!

Might not be annoying to you.

I know what each program does when I run it, I tend to have made them myself OR they were made by Microsoft. I don't want a warning asking me AGAIN if I am sure I want to run it.

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hdood

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You're right, you can turn it off in Windows 7, but still, a quick solution is always nice.

Why bother? Because this method is faster. In Windows itself you need to go to Control Panel etc etc, with this, you run and change the setting. Done.

Erm, you can turn it on and off in the control panel on both Vista and 7, and you can even configure it in detail through the policy editor (to do things like disable the admin approval prompt while still keeping UAC enabled).

How on EARTH is it faster to visit your web page, download this program, and run it? Seriously? Who turns UAC on and off every five minutes so they'd need a program like this? No sane person.

I'm sure it's a nice program that does exactly as advertised, but what the hell?

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jbrooksuk

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Erm, you can turn it on and off in the control panel on both Vista and 7, and you can even configure it in detail through the policy editor (to do things like disable the admin approval prompt while still keeping UAC enabled).

How on EARTH is it faster to visit your web page, download this program, and run it? Seriously? Who turns UAC on and off every five minutes so they'd need a program like this? No sane person.

I'm sure it's a nice program that does exactly as advertised, but what the hell?

Once it's downloaded, it's on your hard drive, so a couple of extra clicks are needed for the FIRST run.

I never said anyone had to use it, I don't even expect anyone to use it.

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hdood

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Might not be annoying to you.

I know what each program does when I run it, I tend to have made them myself OR they were made by Microsoft. I don't want a warning asking me AGAIN if I am sure I want to run it.

How does one know that it's still the same program that will still bring in the exact same third-party code (DLLs, shell extensions, etc) and won't be hijacked by something else? There's no way to know, and that is why there is no "remember this" option. Accepting a UAC prompt manually is already extremely risky as it is because you do not have enough information to make an informed decision. Making it automatically consent is even worse. Now you could argue that you personally never ever run any third-party code at all, but Windows isn't made specifically for you.

Once it's downloaded, it's on your hard drive, so a couple of extra clicks are needed for the FIRST run.

Well, if I drag the User Accounts control panel to the desktop or task bar, it now takes me just two clicks to open the UAC settings. I really don't see how it's something people would do so frequently that they'd need a tool.

Nothing wrong with having one if there's two or three people that want it though, sure, but it's still a bit weird.

Grand Master

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I know what each program does when I run it, I don't want a warning asking me AGAIN if I am sure I want to run it.

The problem will arise when some maleware gets you silentely and you WON'T know what it does and nothing will protect you by asking you IF you want to allow SomeHiddenWierd.EXE to do finish up your PC.

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jbrooksuk

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How does one know that it's still the same program that will still bring in the exact same third-party code (DLLs, shell extensions, etc) and won't be hijacked by something else? There's no way to know, and that is why there is no "remember this" option. Accepting a UAC prompt manually is already extremely risky as it is because you do not have enough information to make an informed decision. Making it automatically consent is even worse. Now you could argue that you personally never ever run any third-party code at all, but Windows isn't made specifically for you.

Well, if I drag the User Accounts control panel to the desktop or task bar, it now takes me just two clicks to open the UAC settings. I really don't see how it's something people would do so frequently that they'd need a tool.

Nothing wrong with having one if there's two or three people that want it though, sure, but it's still a bit weird.

Because the people that use my software know it's safe, I have been programming for 11 years now. I had some spare time and made this. Don't use it, if you don't want to.

I have Windows 7, exactly how I like it. I made this in Vista. Every OS I use is configured for my personal needs. I have made applications to change settings on a hotkey/mouse click.

The problem will arise when some maleware gets you silentely and you WON'T know what it does and nothing will protect you by asking you IF you want to allow SomeHiddenWierd.EXE to do finish up your PC.

I would say I have anti-virus, but even though I do, it doesn't always make us safe.

I don't visit that many different websites. If I try a program I am unsure about, it's in a Virtual PC/Sandboxie. I have automatic backups which allow me to install everything back on to my hard drive easily.

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hdood

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Because the people that use my software know it's safe, I have been programming for 11 years now.

Er? I haven't said that your software isn't safe? I'm saying that the problem is that malware can hijack a program and ride its elevation request. That is why you can't tell it to always elevate a certain program.

Heck, it's why you don't even know what you could be getting half the time even when you manually consent (the only setup that is actually safe is where you have a completely separate administrator account that you have to log onto to make changes and never touch any executable code that other users have access to from it).

I'm trying to explain to you why having an "always elevate this program" option is a lot more dangerous than you seem to think.

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