MMF internal Installer question - Installing into AllUsersAppData

[Tiles]

Shared documents is the worst choice. I hate games and software that puts their settings into this location.

but modifying the ACL permissions will be necessary

I can just repeat: it works like charm here, without the need to change or modify the ACL permissions. The only thing is that i don`t have the software in the start menu with a guest account. But i can access it by explorer.

Now it would be interesting to kow what is different to your setup when you really need to change the permissions.

[Nifflas]

I can just repeat: it works like charm here, without the need to change or modify the ACL permissions.

Are you sure? You shouldn't get write access to it, only read. I've tested this in Windows 7 and it confirms what I knew. Create a text file in ProgramData, and log in as another user, load it, make some modifications and attempt to save it. I sure get a dialog saying that I don't have permission to do this.

A second test; if you create a file in ProgramData, right click it, select properties, security, and check the permissions for User, isn't only "Read & Execute", "Read" enabled?

1: I know this stuff, 2: It's commonly known, googling results in the same knowledge. 3: Modifying ACL is common practice and can be observed by checking the settings on files and folders for other applications within ProgramData, 4: My tests confirm it.

Trust me, even if it works on your particular machine, you will need to think about this. Maybe you're on an older version of Windows where this works differently, maybe whatever software you're using to create the files actually modifies the permissions accordingly, maybe the permissions for ProgramData is different on your machine, so that your files inherits those permissions instead. If it works, it's actually important that you understand why it works so you can determine if this will apply to all other systems too.

[Yves]

Clickteam installer is not able to do such a simple operation like installing a file into the Program Data folder.

You have to use Install Creator Pro for that. The installer provided in MMF2 is similar to Install Creator, not Install Creator Pro.

[Tiles]

Thanks Yves

Are you sure? You shouldn't get write access to it, only read. I've tested this in Windows 7 and it confirms what I knew. Create a text file in ProgramData, and log in as another user, load it, make some modifications and attempt to save it. I sure get a dialog saying that I don't have permission to do this.

Yeah, i get this permission warning too when i want to modify such a text file. But my software nevertheless writes to the ini. No warning. And the values are present when i am back at my other account. Writing was successfull. Modifying a textfile by hand seems to be something different than modifying a ini by a software

I wait for an answer of my user at the moment. We will see.

[Nifflas]

That's interesting, I don't know why that is. Maybe whatever creates the ini files assigns different ACL settings to them. I think you should look this up, it's always best to understand why something works a certain way rather than testing alone. Personally, I never really settled for knowing that something works if I don't know why.

[Tiles]

Interesting indeed. And it continues to stay interesting. I did some experiments with my mobile version. And then the guest account version stopped writing to the ini. I have to run the app as admin in the guest account now so that the values are stored in the ini. Seems that i had a short hiccup that allowed me to pass ACL. Means i was wrong, and you were right. Thanks for staying persistent

At this point i really wish i could have a wall to wall conversation with one of the microsoft programmers. This whole security hassle is absolute worthless nonsense. Nothing than nagging the users and programmers to death. Microsoft really wants me to go around this security bull**** it seems. Okay then, no problem. Let`s try C:\ directly.

EDIT, nope, also here big problems. I can`t even create a folder by hand at C without permission. ACL is the biggest preventing feature ever. Okay then, hands up. I did what was possible. At least the software nevertheless works as a guest. It just cannot write to the ini.


As a sidenote, MMF should have a way to install global. At least the Pro version. That`s an essential feature.

[Tiles]

Just that i have asked, there is no way to modify ACL from within an MMF app, is it?

[Nifflas]

Unfortunately, I don't think there's an extension for it yet (I hope this will change). Another solution you can consider is to extract a set of default settings into a a sub-folder of AppDataDirectory$( "File" ) at the start of your application if the files doesn't exist. In other words, it happens when you launch the application, not during installation. This has worked super nicely for my own games.

Maybe Install Creator Pro allows you to modify the ACL and lets you install for all users in the start menu, I don't have it and can't find enough information on Clickteam's page. If not, Inno Setup does all this, so it'll solve all your problems.

[Tiles]

Thanks Nifflas. That`s of course another option. But this separates the settings by users again though. So also no option for every case.

Yves has stated that the Pro version of Install Creator can install software global. And i guess this also includes ACL modifications. But i think i will give Inno Setup a go now first

[Yves]

i guess this also includes ACL modifications.

Nope, ICP has no options to modify ACLs (though you can do it by running a batch file).