Running certain apps as a limited user

[Coromac]

Decided to post here and ask the advice of the masses, since there are some excellent guides on the site, and everyone seems very helpful.

I have winxp pro, and have two user accounts enabled. An administrator account for me, and a limited user account for everyone else. Others use this account for games etc, but of course some games need to be run with administrator privileges.

The only solutions I can think of are:

1) Change the account type to admin, which I really don't want to do, since I am using NTFS with file permissions set carefully for security.
2) Use 'Run as' everytime they want to play a game (a pain in the ass, since it means I need to be there for the password). Unfortunately it seems that 'Run as' needs to be enabled for each instance the program is run. There is no option to enable 'Run as' for every time the program is run in the future. Or is there?
3) Write a script in VB or C which uses send keys to use 'Run as'. This would send the password, effectively running only selected apps as admin, and I would compile the program into an exe so that my password isn't available to anyone looking for it.

I have done quite a bit of searching on the net for other solutions. Ones I have seen are installing the program only on the limited user account and installing the program on both user accounts. I have tried uninstalling and reinstalling but have had no luck. I have also seen threads on this site referring to the use of gpedit.msc and other microsoft management tools, but these do not seem to have the specific options I am looking for. I have also heard horror stories of people needing to re-install windows after messing everything up with these tools.

Has anyone had similar problems, or can point me in the direction of a certified solution to this?

 

[scriptasylum]

I had a similar problem with my kids' PC. Most newer games keep settings and score files in the user's profile, but there must be some older games that write to an ini file or something in the program directory and unless they have admin access (which I'm not about to do), the program won't work.

What I've done is give the kids full access to the specific folder the game is in. It's not the best solution, but it does work. You just add "everyone" group with full permissions to the directory the game is in.

A better solution would be to figure out which file is changing so you could apply the permissions to just that file. It would be easy to do; just look for the latest modified file, but I'm too lazy.

An even better solution would be to find the right way to do this, but my way works for now.

 

[Coromac]

Thanks for your reply.

Your suggestions seems to work for most games. Another solution I have found was to change the limited user account type from 'user' to 'power user'. If you right click 'My Computer' and choose manage, the options are in there under 'Local Users & Groups'. To ensure that they are not given too much access as a power user, I tweaked power user permissions by using 'gpedit.msc'. I didn't realise the versatility this tool gives, and I haven't had any problems with it so far.

My only remaining problem is Neverwinter Nights. This game checks to see which account type the current user is on, and only runs the game if they are on as an administrator account type. The game itself gives an error message along the lines of 'User must have administrator privileges', so it seems to be a game requirement, not an error that's being returned. I have no idea how I can fix this one. Any ideas?

 

[scriptasylum]

Sorry, I've only done what I have suggested and it worked for all the games the kids want to use so I have never went any further.

Since the game says it needs Admin priveledges then it might need them. You could muddle with the policy editor, but you can mess things up pretty easy this way.

Looks like you're gonna have to let up and allow admin rights, just make a restore point before they use the admin account! :blink:

 

[Coromac]

*sigh* oh well. Thanks for your help. I'll let you know if another solution pops up (since I'm not going to bother looking any more).