Is it possible to (authenticode?) sign an application to prevent UAC prompts? People start creating dirty hacks (SkipUAC ), service helper based applications or disable UAC completely. I don't think that's intended by Microsoft.

Hi Maniaxx, User Account Control (UAC) in Windows 7 helps prevent potentially dangerous software from making changes to your computer without your explicit consent. As you may noticed, there is no UAC setting for individual applications. However, if you are sure certain application is safe and which is frequently used, here is a workaround to run a specific application with administrative privileges without UAC prompts. We can create a shortcut for this application with elevated privileges. 1. Click Start, right click on Computer and choose Manage. 2. Click Task Scheduler on the left panel. 3. Click Create Task on the right panel. 4. Type a name for the task. 5. Check Run with highest privileges. 6. Click Actions tab. 7. Click New. 8. Browse to the program in the Program/script box. Click OK. 9. On desktop, right click, choose New and click Shortcut. 10. In the box type: schtasks.exe /run /tn TaskName where TaskName is the name of task you put in on the basics tab and click next. 11. Type a name for the shortcut and click Finish. Now, you can double click the shortcut to run the program, and the UAC window will not prompt. Hope this helps. Regards, Linda

I'll try it. Thank you!

Linda: Hello! This suggestion works great for an Individual application, when I have administrative privilege to create and then run the task. Thanks! However, is it possible to create a task in the manner you describe while I'm logged on as an administrator on Windows7, which can then be run by any users of the PC (even guests)? -Scott

Hello Linda, "... However, if you are sure certain application is safe..." Most, very most of all application are safe. This is the normal case. But UAC is designed as this is not the normal case with the result, that UAC in so many situation steals your time, makes your work harder. I had so many situations where not a malware or virus breaked my work, no, THE GREATE UAC was standing in the way to finish my work. In my opinion, effort to handle UAC in daily works is relative high, its benefits low.

sorry chinaski , you only say this because you never used a standard user account ;) Do the same steps under XP when you get the UAC prompt in Windows Vista/7 and what the ugly error message "Access denied". What is darder? Accept a UAC prompt or do the ugly "RunAs" operations in XP?"A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/

The work around of creating a task does not help when the program is to be lauched by Windows, for example a program that is associated with a file type. Another idiotic source of frustration courtesy of the mediocre MS.

Can you explain this more? What are you trying to do?"A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/

Every time I install a program that needs to run under XP compatibility mode to run correctly, UAC is launched. I can either turn it off which defeats the benefit of having windows 7. Using the shortcut is not a help as the program is associated with certain filetypes (image files) so the user tries to open an image file associated with the original exe file the dreaded UAC launches.

yes, remove the shortcut and create a shortcut which runs the Task: schtasks.exe /RUN /TN "Taskname" "A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/

I turned off the local security policy to automatically elevate for administrators or admin mode but I hope this is not the same as turning off UAC.

Why are you not following the steps Linda gave you?"A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/

Linda's advice worked great for my uac problem. Thanks

This solution does not work for enterprise level applications being deployed to hundreds/thousands of users. Is there any way that is more enterprise?

this solution only works if your user is part of the admin group."A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/

Thank you Linda. And for a bonus, I can drag that new shortcut into the Startup folder so my favourite program starts at boot without the UAC dialogue. (Start/All Programs/Startup then right-click to open Startup folder)

For the sake of being tidy: If you right click on the Task Scheduler Library you can add a folder.Then add your tasks in that folder. Just be sure to put the name of that folder in your shortcut - You'll need to wrap the path in quotes for it to work though: C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /run /tn "\User Defined\Your Task Name UAC" Note: I found moving tasks to folders is not straight forward. However I was able to Export the task I had created in / to my desktop (it's XML) and then import into my new folder. Then I deleted the one in / Hope that is of use ;) ~D