Can a VB6 program get around UAC?

[Senefelder]

Is there any way to change a VB6 program so that it is NOT stopped from automatically starting by User Account Control in Windows 7? It works fine now IF UAC is shut down, but not at all if it is not.

[jonc]

You could right click on the executable (or shortcut) and select "Run As Administrator".

What is within the application which urgently needs administrative privileges though? Is there a way you could get around that rather than hoping to get around UAC?
Maybe you could find an ActiveX component which is Win7 compliant that could do certain tasks for you? (or if you know .NET, you could write an InterOp DLL which should (if I remember right) support UAC).

[vb5prgrmr]

Right Click>run as admin or the use of a manifest file that requests higher privileges may work for you. See M$ and the web for more info...

Good Luck

[Salem]

Rewrite your app so it conforms to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_least_privilege

Unless your app absolutely needs admin, then there's no reason why it should need it just because the programmers are too lazy.

Too many shoddy programs running with elevated privileges is one of the reasons why there's so much spam and malware about.

[Senefelder]

Maybe I should explain a bit better! Starting the program in Administrator mode is rather difficult, because it is supposed to start automatically at boot time AND later, using a task scheduler for the latter. I have tried giving it administrator privileges, but it didn't seem to help. All that helps is cancelling UAC. The problem apparently happens when the application (a REMINDER app) tries to access it's data file, which is in the form of "reminder.dat" on the C: drive. Originally, I had the .dat file made in the application folder, but that didn't work either, so I tried changing it. By the way, this program ran perfectly well under 32 bit Vista, but will not run under either 32 bit or 64 bit Windows 7.

[Salem]

So put the data files in a "user" folder rather than some "protected" location like the program files folder (or worse locations like c:\windows or just c:\ ).

Surely you would want the reminders to be on a "per user" basis anyway to begin with (or are you still assuming a single user model from good-ole DOS days).