Administrative password

[Guest]

I purchased a computer with Dell with Vista Home addition
and then upgraded it to Ultimate. The problem I having is that
I've created an account for myself with administrator rights
and I have unchecked the UAC box to prevent the popups from
happening. Yet, the popups still occur and programs such as
OneCare do not recognize me as an administrator.

Any ideas?
Thanks
SamA

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Sam

Please don't take this personally, but I find it comical that someone would
be installing a program (OneCare) to make their computer safer and more
secure, right after they have disabled the most important, and easiest to
use, security component (UAC) that has ever been added to Windows.

 

[Guest]

Ronnie,
I'm not taking it personal but there are times when I want to do something
and I don't want to be bothered by the UAC message. That said it appears to
be disabled but it isn't. So, humor aside is there something I can do to
understand how to disable and then re-enable UAC when I feel it appropriate.

BTW, I find it humorous that a human would allow software to make decisions
for him and be comfortable with those decisions all of the time.

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Sam

I'm not taking it personal but there are times when I want to do something
and I don't want to be bothered by the UAC message. That said it appears
to
be disabled but it isn't. So, humor aside is there something I can do to
understand how to disable and then re-enable UAC when I feel it
appropriate.

Yes, but the disabling/enabling of UAC would be even more difficult and time
consuming than just leaving it enabled? It only takes one click to dismiss
the UAC prompt when it appears?

BTW, I find it humorous that a human would allow software to make
decisions
for him and be comfortable with those decisions all of the time.

This is a common misconception. UAC does 'NOT' make any decisions for you.
What UAC does is to inform you if a program tries to gain global,
unrestricted, access to your computer. UAC notifies you, puts the system in
a secure state, (Secure Desktop) and then it asks for 'YOUR' permission to
continue. UAC has no information on 'what' the program will do, 'YOU' must
make the decision, depending on whether or not you trust that program.

If you run with full administrator privileges a program can just silently
install and make any changes it wishes and you will never be aware of that
fact until the deed is done.

The real problem that we're facing is that the new security model for Vista
is requiring users to 'learn something new and do something different' to
enable them to operate more securely. Users are balking because they want to
'do things the way they have always done them'.

 

[Guest]

Ronnie,
Ronnie,
I'm afraid that discussing security is like discussing religion, we will
never see the other person’s point of view. I fully understand the purpose of
UAC and how it works as it is little more than an updated UNIX command called
sudo. I can also appreciate why it was placed into the Windows environment
and I think it is about time that there were multiple levels of security in
Windows. What we will never agree on is why a user might want to turn it on
or off or why if the GUI that says that it is disable is not actually
disabling the “featureâ€.

I really do appreciate your insights into this issue and your taking the
time to discuss this with me.

Thanks
Sam