Can't see all users under HKEY_USERS

[John Hardin]

It was my understanding that HKEY_CURRENT_USER was mapped in under
HKEY_USERS. I had hoped that the local machine administrator could access
all registry information for all users, but I don't find this to be true.
I'm working on the uninstall code for a product which creates registry
entries under HKEY_CURRENT_USER and I had hoped that the local machine
administrator would be able to do a complete uninstall. It now appears that
each user will have to log in and do the uninstall. How do developers
normally deal with uninstall?

Thanks for any enlightenment you can offer.

John

 

[News Reader]

I'm not sure but I believe HKEY_USERS shows only those user profiles, which
are currently active. As an administrator you can of course load inactive
profiles. Use regedt32.exe. Activate HKEY_USERS and then from file -> load
hive. Browse path to desired ntuser.dat, for example "Default
User\ntuser.dat". Give name for that hive. Now you can access that profile.
Remember unload the hive when you are ready. You have to use regedt32 to
load hive, but after hive is loaded, you can switch to regedit and use that
to editing. I have used that method to customize new users default profile.

nico