Vista UAC and Amazon.com -- MSFT staff Please read this!

Hi,

I recently tried out the new amazon.com video thing called "Unboxed".

I found that on Vista it does a UAC on *EVERY BOOT* it's starting up a "tray app" / notification thing that asks for the admin rights.

so I sent Amazon an email asking when they would fix this as it should not have to work that way.

I got an email that is just plain wrong.... it will prompt many users to turn off UAC... due to the horribly bad wording they use.

and it makes UAC sound like some kind of evil thing... built to harm the user and make life hard.... 

here is the text of the email:

"Greetings from the Amazon Unbox Team!

Thank you for your continued interest in Amazon Unbox video downloads.

I am truly sorry for any frustration you have experienced using Amazon Unbox on Windows Vista.

User Account Control (UAC) is a new security mechanism introduced in Windows Vista, whose primary goal is to force users to work using restricted accounts, instead working as administrators.  And because Amazon Unbox requires the user to have administrators privileges, Windows Vista users receive an UAC prompt before loading Amazon Unbox.

For further information on UAC please contact Microsoft.

I hope this information is helpful.

Thank you for shopping at Amazon.com."

--Edit:  fixed formatting of email.

I hate it when they do that - don't answer your question and act as if you don't know what you're talking about.

littleguru wrote:

Incredible! Seems like they don't know how to code or perhaps this thing is some kind of spyware that collects all different data and returns it to their servers.

I would uninstall it and write them an e-mail that you can't have something that requires admin rights on your computer.

This is definitively the wrong direction that Amazon is taking on this here. Somebody from Microsoft should really call them and clarify!

Unfortunately, I believe that this is a trend that will continue, just as it has continued for years.  Even with the lack of UAC in previous versions of Windows, software vendors have consistantly flat out refused to follow guidelines as to writing software which doesn't require administrator privileges (yet, for some reason, the same software vendors don't seem to have a problem following the same guildines for Mac or Linux). 

If, in the past, software vendors have gone so far as to program a macro that automatically clicks "continue anyway" when a driver isn't signed, we have no reason to believe things will change, and we'll see software that includes as #1 on the installation instructions :  "Disable UAC" with technical support groups for these software vendors helping the end-users do it.

UAC will defnitely be a failure.  It won't be Microsoft's fault though.

It also doesn't help that a ton of computer geeks inhabiting our planet are also regularly turning off UAC on their Grandma's computer "because it's lame."

fknight wrote:

Unfortunately, I believe that this is a trend that will continue, just as it has continued for years.  Even with the lack of UAC in previous versions of Windows, software vendors have consistantly flat out refused to follow guidelines as to writing software which doesn't require administrator privileges (yet, for some reason, the same software vendors don't seem to have a problem following the same guildines for Mac or Linux). 

If, in the past, software vendors have gone so far as to program a macro that automatically clicks "continue anyway" when a driver isn't signed, we have no reason to believe things will change, and we'll see software that includes as #1 on the installation instructions :  "Disable UAC" with technical support groups for these software vendors helping the end-users do it.

UAC will defnitely be a failure.  It won't be Microsoft's fault though.

It also doesn't help that a ton of computer geeks inhabiting our planet are also regularly turning off UAC on their Grandma's computer "because it's lame."

fknight wrote:

If, in the past, software vendors have gone so far as to program a macro that automatically clicks "continue anyway" when a driver isn't signed,

I've seen installers that specifically instruct you to not install on the system drive if you're running Vista, just to avoid the default file system permissions of Program Files. This demonstrates a particular ignorance to the fact that their app would also not work under XP if the user isn't an administrator...

This kind of reasoning is inexcusable (and MS is guilty of it too with the way the "Visual Studio requires admin rights" message is worded if you run VS2005 SP1 under Vista). There should be a fine or something.

LarryOsterman wrote:

What's really annoying is that Vista refuses to run startup applications that are manifested to require elevation just to avoid this.

Sven Groot wrote:

I've seen installers that specifically instruct you to not install on the system drive if you're running Vista, just to avoid the default file system permissions of Program Files. This demonstrates a particular ignorance to the fact that their app would also not work under XP if the user isn't an administrator...

This kind of reasoning is inexcusable (and MS is guilty of it too with the way the "Visual Studio requires admin rights" message is worded if you run VS2005 SP1 under Vista). There should be a fine or something.

figuerres wrote:



Sven Groot wrote: I've seen installers that specifically instruct you to not install on the system drive if you're running Vista, just to avoid the default file system permissions of Program Files. This demonstrates a particular ignorance to the fact that their app would also not work under XP if the user isn't an administrator... This kind of reasoning is inexcusable (and MS is guilty of it too with the way the "Visual Studio requires admin rights" message is worded if you run VS2005 SP1 under Vista). There should be a fine or something.

Seven:  I do not know if you have tried the VS2008 B2 yet but it does not need run as admin (at least not yet) and I do not see the docs saying it needs admin.

I hope that means MSFT got that fixed!

Sven Groot wrote:



figuerres wrote:  Sven Groot wrote: I've seen installers that specifically instruct you to not install on the system drive if you're running Vista, just to avoid the default file system permissions of Program Files. This demonstrates a particular ignorance to the fact that their app would also not work under XP if the user isn't an administrator... This kind of reasoning is inexcusable (and MS is guilty of it too with the way the "Visual Studio requires admin rights" message is worded if you run VS2005 SP1 under Vista). There should be a fine or something. Seven:  I do not know if you have tried the VS2008 B2 yet but it does not need run as admin (at least not yet) and I do not see the docs saying it needs admin. I hope that means MSFT got that fixed!

I hope so. I mean, sure there are some development tasks that require you to have admin rights, but they are so rare. I never need to elevate VS for my development needs. Of course, this is going to vary depending on what kind of development you're doing, but it's still stupid to put up a blanket statement suggesting all developers run VS as admin all the time, when it's plainly not needed.

If VS2008 gets rid of the message, great. If it actually put the admin-required tasks in separate processes and supports elevating when they are required, even greater! Anyone running VS2008 on Vista who can check what happens here?

EDIT: Also, I am not a number.

littleguru wrote:


I'm downloading it right now. I'll install it on Vista. Perhaps, of nobody else did before., I can report

I'm seeing kind of a mixed trend here. Some applications still require admin permissions where they don't need them, and refuse to fix their stuff for Vista. Others are actively updating their applications or have already done so. I hope the latter mindset ultimately wins out.

As far as the email: awful. I hate 'support' like that. The worst support I've ever had was in one of those chat things with a support guy from Sony. After going through a number of steps he obviously found in his support script, I eventually received the message "Ensure that your virus and spyware scanners are disabled, and reboot the PC. This should fix your problem. #supportguy043 has logged off." Damn you, Sony. Damn you.

Sven Groot wrote:


EDIT: Also, I am not a number.

Bas wrote:

I'm seeing kind of a mixed trend here. Some applications still require admin permissions where they don't need them, and refuse to fix their stuff for Vista. Others are actively updating their applications or have already done so. I hope the latter mindset ultimately wins out.

As far as the email: awful. I hate 'support' like that. The worst support I've ever had was in one of those chat things with a support guy from Sony. After going through a number of steps he obviously found in his support script, I eventually received the message "Ensure that your virus and spyware scanners are disabled, and reboot the PC. This should fix your problem. #supportguy043 has logged off." Damn you, Sony. Damn you.