Starts only in Admin Mode?

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Roofio
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Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by Roofio »

My game starts only in Admin mode, it seems. Without that, it will freeze upon start up before the "new game..." dialogue appears. Win 10 64 bit (German), installing and running the game from a different account than the admin one.
If checking for updates from the Launcher (which requires admin rights password) first and launching afterwards, game will start correctly, same as well when setting "launch as admin" in the .exe properties.

Working as intended? Would be nice to start it without having to enter the admin password every time.

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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

most games need admin permissions, only way around it i know of is to install it as admin, eg right click install as admin, but tbh you really should be playing and installing on a admin account, as most games need admin permissions to save or even use a temp folder etc

can't say i've been asked this one before either, as 99% on here are the administrator on the pc they install on.

as it makes little sense not to, as you have the admin password anyway?

removed links, not needed
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ralphtricky
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by ralphtricky »

ORIGINAL: Roofio

My game starts only in Admin mode, it seems. Without that, it will freeze upon start up before the "new game..." dialogue appears. Win 10 64 bit (German), installing and running the game from a different account than the admin one.
If checking for updates from the Launcher (which requires admin rights password) first and launching afterwards, game will start correctly, same as well when setting "launch as admin" in the .exe properties.

Working as intended? Would be nice to start it without having to enter the admin password every time.

Did you install the program to the default installation directory? Can I ask what your username is on your PC? I'm wondering if it's getting confused by that.

Thanks,
Ralph
Ralph Trickey
TOAW IV Programmer
Blog: http://operationalwarfare.com
---
My comments are my own, and do not represent the views of any other person or entity. Nothing that I say should be construed in any way as a promise of anything.
Roofio
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by Roofio »

Yes, no change to the installation routine whatsoever. The Admin account is called Admin Robert and the account I am using for everyday things and installed the game to is called standard robert.
My guess would be that it gets confused with MyDocuments Folders and access rights there, since the game loads up fast and proper, than freezes completly when the "new Game" dialogue should appear.Having admin rights goes through straight away.

Just checked the "MyDocuments" folder in both accounts. Strangely, both have a TOAW4 folder. In admin, it is roughly 540 mb, in standard, it is only 2,5 mb.

Hope that helps!
Robert
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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

was the pc updated from a previous version of windows?

what was printed didn't work, just tried it, so will wait for a reply first for question above
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ralphtricky
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by ralphtricky »

ORIGINAL: Roofio

Yes, no change to the installation routine whatsoever. The Admin account is called Admin Robert and the account I am using for everyday things and installed the game to is called standard robert.
My guess would be that it gets confused with MyDocuments Folders and access rights there, since the game loads up fast and proper, than freezes completly when the "new Game" dialogue should appear.Having admin rights goes through straight away.

Just checked the "MyDocuments" folder in both accounts. Strangely, both have a TOAW4 folder. In admin, it is roughly 540 mb, in standard, it is only 2,5 mb.

Hope that helps!
Robert
Robert,
It really sounds like you accidentally installed using the admin account instead of your own account. See if you can run it when logged in as the admin. You should uninstall and re-install and see if that fixes it.

I know you said you did, but that's my only explanation on why there is anything under the admin/documents folder.
Ralph Trickey
TOAW IV Programmer
Blog: http://operationalwarfare.com
---
My comments are my own, and do not represent the views of any other person or entity. Nothing that I say should be construed in any way as a promise of anything.
Roofio
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by Roofio »

Ralph, no harm in trying but no such luck, I'm afraid:

Deinstalled, manually deleted the TOAW Folder in the my documents of both accounts. deleted all registry entries referring to toaw that I could find.
restarted, then installed TOAW4 with all custom settings from the standard account.



Same result:
The folder structure remains the same split between Admin and Standard as described above.
Edit: Just checked on the difference in file size: In the standard account, "My Fonts" and "Sounds" are missing as folders, the other three are there, but empty. In Admin, they are all there and contain files.
Without running the engine will load up, but will then fail to load the first menu (New game...).
With "run as admin" checked in compability, it runs fine after the admin password query.

One other thing I noted: Despite installing it with the standard account (Windows settings here are to provide the admin password to allow installation by another account than the admins), it creates a desctop shortcut for the admin account, but fails to create a shortcut for the standard account.
Looks to me like TOAW focuses on the admin account, no matter from which account it is installed and whether or not Windows would allow it to do otherwise (I have several other games installed via the standard account that do not have this problem).

By the way, no former version of Windos installed. This was a clean install of Win10.




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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

Win 10 64 bit (German), installing and running the game from a different account than the admin one.

will need to run some tests on this one, as im not sure it can be done as you request,

as one account, the main one is an administrator account, with the other one, your gaming one a standard non admin one? correct?

if you install on the admin account and set it up to give all users permissions to use and run, it should work fine as long as you give the second account admin permissions, as without it, nothing will be able to be installed or run on this account without first giving admin permissions to run

Code: Select all

https://www.cnet.com/uk/how-to/how-to-check-if-your-windows-10-account-is-administrator/

or M/S version

Code: Select all

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/4026923/windows-create-a-local-user-or-administrator-account-in-windows-10

to install programs from the Standard user account, supplying the password/OK to the UAC prompt each and ever time the game runs will be needed, this is a windows 10 permissions issue and not something the game requires.

as Standard User account can't access programs installed by Administrators account, unless permissions have been given and set for it.

Code: Select all

https://www.microsoftpressstore.com/articles/article.aspx?p=2453566



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ralphtricky
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by ralphtricky »

ORIGINAL: Roofio

Ralph, no harm in trying but no such luck, I'm afraid:

Deinstalled, manually deleted the TOAW Folder in the my documents of both accounts. deleted all registry entries referring to toaw that I could find.
restarted, then installed TOAW4 with all custom settings from the standard account.



Same result:
The folder structure remains the same split between Admin and Standard as described above.
Edit: Just checked on the difference in file size: In the standard account, "My Fonts" and "Sounds" are missing as folders, the other three are there, but empty. In Admin, they are all there and contain files.
Without running the engine will load up, but will then fail to load the first menu (New game...).
With "run as admin" checked in compability, it runs fine after the admin password query.

One other thing I noted: Despite installing it with the standard account (Windows settings here are to provide the admin password to allow installation by another account than the admins), it creates a desctop shortcut for the admin account, but fails to create a shortcut for the standard account.
Looks to me like TOAW focuses on the admin account, no matter from which account it is installed and whether or not Windows would allow it to do otherwise (I have several other games installed via the standard account that do not have this problem).

By the way, no former version of Windos installed. This was a clean install of Win10.




Try running the installation program while logged in as your normal user by right-clicking and doing 'run as administrator.' This is different from 'Run as user' and picking your administrator account.

If that fails, try copying all the TOAW files from your admin folder to your normal folder and see if that helps.

Ralph


Ralph Trickey
TOAW IV Programmer
Blog: http://operationalwarfare.com
---
My comments are my own, and do not represent the views of any other person or entity. Nothing that I say should be construed in any way as a promise of anything.
aperfecturkel
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by aperfecturkel »

Hey Roofio! To add to what Ralph was saying:

The installer's default option to create a shortcut only for the user running the installer gave me the clue - it sounds like, when you launch the installer, you're having to elevate to your administrative user, correct? Which I assume also happens if you did the right-click "Run as Administrator" option on the installer. During install, it would've needed admin rights to create a folder and otherwise make changes in "Program Files (x86)" - so if you didn't have to elevate to run the TOAWIV installer, I'd be pretty damn surprised.

It's almost definitely building the user folder that it actually needs, with the scenarios and player settings and all, under your admin account's user folder. I think Ralph's "if that fails" is right - try copying C:\Users\(admin)\Documents\My Games\The Operational Art of War IV to C:\Users\(standard user)\Documents\My Games\, and see if the game fires up without having to launch as admin.

We run into this at work on a fairly regular basis. Mad kudos for running as a standard user, though. As the security dragoon at my employer, that's...rare to see outside of an enterprise environment.

EDIT: Edited to say, you should be fine just copying the folders - I'm crawling the registry now, and all of the keys seem to be user-independent, in the HKLM node.
deep42
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by deep42 »

EDIT: Edited to say, you should be fine just copying the folders

I would really like to know, who had the idea to install application specific data like scenery files into a user directory. That is an absolute amateurish mistake. The devs should correct this problem asap, at least before the next patch otherwise those users who had to work around this, will get the next problem.

Nevertheless after playing for some hours, TOAW IV is great. :)
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ralphtricky
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by ralphtricky »

Actually, that was a design decision to make it easier for people to update scenarios and add additional ones. I felt it was easier to put them all in one place instead of splitting them between the stock and user defined versions. It's also easier for people to find things under the Documents Directory.

I prefer the Mac/Linux practics of putting everything into one directory, but this is Windows and we need to use what works best for Windows.
Ralph Trickey
TOAW IV Programmer
Blog: http://operationalwarfare.com
---
My comments are my own, and do not represent the views of any other person or entity. Nothing that I say should be construed in any way as a promise of anything.
aperfecturkel
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by aperfecturkel »

edit: Welp, Ralph beat me to it!

Eeeenh I can see it deep42, but it makes sense that anything potentially user-customizable - scenarios, sounds, eqp files, settings INIs, etc - would be in a standard-user spot like their user folder. There's now more than a decade of precedence of games using the Documents\My Games folder to store stuff like that. Hell, even in the grognard world, the Combat Mission games have been doing this since Fortress Italy.

Getting around needing to run the installer as an admin is tricky, if the installer itself is what builds the User folder content. I think - though could be wrong - that many modern games get around this by building the user folder upon launching the game as that user for the first time. I'm not...really sure how hard that is to implement, though. I assume they utilize some kind of "template" folder, which the .exe copies to the user location if it doesn't detect one already present under the current user.
deep42
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by deep42 »

Thanks for sharing your opinions.

Nevertheless I think the solution is one of the worst of all bad solutions. You punish all those security aware guys, who doesn't want to use an admin account for daily work. And it would be so easy to get it right.

All application specfic data like scenarios should go to the ProgramData (AllUsers) folder, only user specific data like save files should go into the documents folder. Moreover even user scenarios could remain in the documents\My games folder. With some lines of additional program code scenarios could be loaded from both folders. That would be juts two folders and I think it should be easy to give those scenerio developers some hints in the manual to get them going. Alle other users wouldn't even be aware of those two folders.

Now as it is like it is, the installer should at least give a warning if a user tries to install with a non-admin account.
but this is Windows and we need to use what works best for Windows.
I agree, but the current solution definitvily doesn't work and it violates all OS guidelines.

Just my two cents.
the Combat Mission games have been doing this since Fortress Italy.
Combat Mission is from 2007. Times change and you do not have to copy anything, that someone did wrong in the past. ;)

-Peter
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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

was going to reply to your comments deep42, but have kept my opinions to myself and have asked for a staff or board administrators opinion and reply on it who will reply asap

have copied the posts and sent them to be reviewed on how they are now, un edited.

nothing to worry about, just don't agree with your opinion or advice offered.

as the installer works for 99% of windows user so is WAD "working as designed" and is purely a permissions issue, all posts and replies need to be based on facts and gaming advice, not work place or office use, as the guidelines used atm are for full admin permissions as a pre requisites to installing etc.
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deep42
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by deep42 »

OK understand. But allow me one very last comment.
and is purely a permissions issue
I disagree because it is a security issue. Gaming software coexists on computers with office and for example financial software, so the gaming industry should pay attention to IT security too and doesn't force users to use admin accounts, writing files in the Windows folder [:o] (fb.asp?m=4379797), writing files to the program folder (not TOAW AFAIK but other MatrixGames-software) etc.
Just dreaming, maybe some day.. ;)
Thanks for listening.
-Peter
Roofio
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by Roofio »

ORIGINAL: aperfecturkel

Hey Roofio! To add to what Ralph was saying:

The installer's default option to create a shortcut only for the user running the installer gave me the clue - it sounds like, when you launch the installer, you're having to elevate to your administrative user, correct? Which I assume also happens if you did the right-click "Run as Administrator" option on the installer. During install, it would've needed admin rights to create a folder and otherwise make changes in "Program Files (x86)" - so if you didn't have to elevate to run the TOAWIV installer, I'd be pretty damn surprised.

It's almost definitely building the user folder that it actually needs, with the scenarios and player settings and all, under your admin account's user folder. I think Ralph's "if that fails" is right - try copying C:\Users\(admin)\Documents\My Games\The Operational Art of War IV to C:\Users\(standard user)\Documents\My Games\, and see if the game fires up without having to launch as admin.

We run into this at work on a fairly regular basis. Mad kudos for running as a standard user, though. As the security dragoon at my employer, that's...rare to see outside of an enterprise environment.

EDIT: Edited to say, you should be fine just copying the folders - I'm crawling the registry now, and all of the keys seem to be user-independent, in the HKLM node.

Many thanks aperfecturkel and Ralph,

Copying the content from admin account over to the folder in standard account did the trick, game runs without admin rights now. Very nice!
And cannot recommend the dual account setup enough in general, even though I had to run trough some loops here. Safed my bacon big time when I ran into some rensomware a few years back (since you always remember to back up your files 30 seconds after you cannot any longer [;)])
deep42
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by deep42 »

Copying the content from admin account over to the folder in standard account did the trick,
Robert,
for the next update I recommend you to change your default account temporarily for the installation to an admin account (Systemsteuerung->Benutzerkonten->Eigenen Kontotyp ändern). Then the installer won't switch to user "Admin Robert" and the new stuff immediately will end up in the correct user folder. Otherwise you will have to merge the two user folders after installation.
-Peter
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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

ORIGINAL: deep42

OK understand. But allow me one very last comment.
and is purely a permissions issue
I disagree because it is a security issue. Gaming software coexists on computers with office and for example financial software, so the gaming industry should pay attention to IT security too and doesn't force users to use admin accounts, writing files in the Windows folder [:o] (fb.asp?m=4379797), writing files to the program folder (not TOAW AFAIK but other MatrixGames-software) etc.
Just dreaming, maybe some day.. ;)
Thanks for listening.
-Peter

you can make as many comments as you like, it's a free world, but bad advice and mixing the work environment best practices with games in the end will only result in a warning at least, or being asked to keep your personal opinions to your self with regards to the tech support section, maybe in General would be a more or better place to stand on a soap box and preach, as there are good gaming advice and then there's bad, telling a developer he is and i'll quote your words from your replies
absolute amateurish mistake



The devs should correct this problem asap, at least before the next patch otherwise those users who had to work around this, will get the next problem.

so your asking a developer to spend time altering what has been the standard way of doing something which works 99.9% of the time for one user who has a permissions issue? which would then impact everyone else who was able to install fine, maybe causing them to have to uninstall and re do it elsewhere?

are you for real? or is this a wind up?

as you quote facts as if there from a book, but provide no links to where it is written?
Nevertheless I think the solution is one of the worst of all bad solutions. You punish all those security aware guys, who doesn't want to use an admin account for daily work. And it would be so easy to get it right.

All application specfic data like scenarios should go to the ProgramData (AllUsers) folder, only user specific data like save files should go into the documents folder. Moreover even user scenarios could remain in the documents\My games folder. With some lines of additional program code scenarios could be loaded from both folders. That would be juts two folders and I think it should be easy to give those scenerio developers some hints in the manual to get them going. Alle other users wouldn't even be aware of those two folders.

Now as it is like it is, the installer should at least give a warning if a user tries to install with a non-admin account.
I agree, but the current solution definitvily doesn't work and it violates all OS guidelines.

Just my two cents.

while tech support is open to anyone who wishes to help others out and is part of a free forum and is very welcomed by everyone, so replies and opinions should better be left to be thought, and not maybe mentioned or printed, as altering them after the fact or having no way of backing up a position then at a later date makes the remarks, look rather foolish.

thanks for your opinion and all
I disagree because it is a security issue. Gaming software coexists on computers with office and for example financial software, so the gaming industry should pay attention to IT security too and doesn't force users to use admin accounts, writing files in the Windows folder (fb.asp?m=4379797), writing files to the program folder (not TOAW AFAIK but other MatrixGames-software) etc.
Just dreaming, maybe some day.. ;)
Thanks for listening.


but please, please keep remarks to helping out the user who first posted, not trying to make a speech about how tech advanced you feel with knowledge from the work place and try and force the gaming industry to rewrite what it's been doing for years, with success i may add, without some form of back up proof that your way is better, by links with facts and results, which then admin and the developer could read and once understood maybe agree with your opinion.
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zakblood
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RE: Starts only in Admin Mode?

Post by zakblood »

post has now been reported to forum leader and staff, so hopefully it will either be locked, or some forum advice will be given on the direction of the replies in this thread
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