registry security from .net

[jpritchard]

hi,

just wonder if somebody has a perspective.

I am attempting to try out in c# some of the things was happy with in VB6....

I have looked for many code samples and to read the registry I am using something like

RegistryKey testkey = Registry.LocalMachine.OpenSubKey("Software", true);

I have tried load of slighty different code - always I get a System.Security.SecurityException from mscorlib.dll.

I am a local admin of the machine I am running on and can regedit to the key I am viewing.


questions

- do .net form apps run in the context of the user involking them?

or

- is there additional security on the registry calls (over and above the usual reg-key protection that I can play with via Regedt32)

or am I just barking mad!!

cheers AJP

[Pirate]

Well , your .NET application verifies the security attributes it has to the local machine security , if access is denied then your app shut down immediately throwing security exception . However , since you have admin privilages then this is not a problem . You need more security code to gain access to some reg keys though .

private string LoadRegSettings()
{    
string subkey="";
RegistryKey regkey;
try 
{                                
regkey = Registry.LocalMachine.OpenSubKey(@"SOFTWARE\YourAppName\Settings");                    
subkey =regkey.GetValue("AnyValueYouSetHereIsRetrieved").ToString();
regkey.Close();                
    }
    catch 
    {            
MessageBox.Show("subkey is empty");
}            
return subkey;
} 

I'm using this code and it works good , even for regular user permissions .