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c#windowswindows-8registryuac
Ivan Milanov
Ivan Milanov

Reputation: 79

Cannot read a registry value in Windows 8

I have following C# code, which reads the UAC state from registry in Windows 7

object obj = Registry.LocalMachine.GetValue(@"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\EnableLUA", (long)1);

It works perfectly on Windows 7 with admin/not-admin accounts. It always returns the default value I provide it under Windows 8. The registry key is there. I can see its value with regedit. But the C# code does not read it. Can anybody tell why? It is a .net 4 application. The user account is unelevated admin.

Upvotes: 4

Views: 2933

Answers (2)

regmagik
regmagik

Reputation: 844

It returns the default value (on both Windows 7 and 8). Here's the code that reads the correct Registry value on both Windows 7 and 8, without running as administrator.

        object obj = Registry.GetValue( 
             @"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\", 
             "EnableLUA", 
             (long)1);

Note that we call GetValue method on Registry, not on Registry.LocalMachine, and we pass key and value name as two separate parameters.

Upvotes: 5

Anon Ops
Anon Ops

Reputation: 1

You need to require administrative privileges at least to be able to access the registry by default. Windows 8 developers possibly thinks it's safer to keep it that way.

Upvotes: -1

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