Software Permissions

[TechMonkey]

Having a bit of a crisis of confidence. I've just encountered the second piece of software I am having to abandon due to it not working on our system, probably due to permissions or access denied. I'm pretty sure that it is due to badly coded software but having worked through with the company on the latest piece and them giving up as well saying it is our network, I'm now worried that I have set something up too tight.

 

The latest piece was Swim Team Manager. I'm tempted to shrug it off as bad software as by default it wants to install to a folder directly in the C drive and creates a second folder under the C drive for storing data. It is a VB/access database program, so top quality. Ended up setting all the folders they say need access to be full control to Everyone, Authenticated Users and Administrators but still it won't work except for the admin that installed it. Even the local administrator account and another admin couldn't run it.

 

I know it is very vague but can anyone think of anything that could be locked down too tight? Or a way to track down these issues? I even ran Process Monitor on both the working logon and a non-working logon and couldn't find much difference or any access denied entries.

[mrwoberts]

Just some ideas...

Is it ODBC related? Does the app create a Data Source, if so, is it creating a System or User data source...

Is it attempting to alter any files in the all users profile? Or worse, the Windows folder...

[Sagima]

My only check would be - does it work fine without the group policies being applied. If it does then I'd track down which policy was actually causing it to fail and then review it to see if it's scope was necessary - if not change it to lesson the impact or find an alternative policy to achieve the same result with less problems.

 

Schools do seem to end up with some quite shi**y software though so I wouldn't shoulder all of the blame. If 99.9% of stuff works and product X doesn't product X can generally f off

[Norphy]

If these people are still using programming techniques that were considered shoddy back in the late nineties then yes, it's totally their fault.

[TechMonkey]

If these people are still using programming techniques that were considered shoddy back in the late nineties then yes, it's totally their fault.

Thank you!!! This is my immediate thought but I seem to be the only school complaining. Ohh yes I forgot to mention this is a piece of software that suddenly any school that wants to enter swim meets in the area must use. Why not an online system?! & why use a complicated system for PE teachers!!!!

 

I do feel better as I just tried it on a laptop that is not on the network and it failed under the same circumstances. Works as the user that installed it but not a standard user. mrwoberts might be on to something with that thought.

[TechMonkey]

HA!!!! I win. It wasn't user permissions. The company was installing masses of information in the Current User hive, which, of course, no other user could access. Once I imported that data across it all worked. Of course this is far from ideal, and a totally dirty fix, but until the company can program in a modern way it will have to do

 

Network juice for me tonight!!

[mrwoberts]

Glad you managed to fix this one. Very satisfying.

Are you in a position to feedback to the company that sold you the software, seems like they could do with your help to fix this.

[TechMonkey]

Ohhh yes, I did a full Grishenko when it worked.

I was in contact with their support and let them know. Their attitude was it works for other people, we must have a unique set up.

Luckily we didn't buy the software, we were given the lite version to be able to export and send the data to someone who has the full version. Again, why no web based software could be found to do this to allow the desperate nature of the schools that have to do this I have no idea!

[Arthur]

The company was installing masses of information in the Current User hive, which, of course, no other user could access. Once I imported that data across it all worked. Of course this is far from ideal, and a totally dirty fix, but until the company can program in a modern way it will have to do

To be fair, many Windows programs store user-specific settings in HKCU. e.g. 7-Zip, Adobe Reader, Google Earth, SketchUp, Paint.net etc. etc.

 

The alternative is to have numerous files scattered across your user profile.

[Norphy]

To be fair, many Windows programs store user-specific settings in HKCU. e.g. 7-Zip, Adobe Reader, Google Earth, SketchUp, Paint.net etc. etc.

 

The alternative is to have numerous files scattered across your user profile.

 

Well, yes, that's reasonable but none of those programs store all of their settings in the user registry hive and none of them stop working when you log in as a different user. The OP's program has been badly coded.

[Arthur]

none of them stop working when you log in as a different user.

Good point!

[TechMonkey]

Well, yes, that's reasonable but none of those programs store all of their settings in the user registry hive and none of them stop working when you log in as a different user. The OP's program has been badly coded.

 

Ding, correct answer. Having had a look around you either have the majority of settings in HKLM and then when a user first starts settings relating to that user, and that user only, get created in HKCU. Alternatively you create a per-user install. As far as I can tell everything gets dropped into HKCU. Most of it is Crystal Reports

 

The registry file I imported was 31,238 lines long. Obviously a fair amount of white space and didn't have any trimming as I can't tell easily what is to do with the program and what was all ready there but that was taken from a new, fresh install that had no other software installed.