VISTA: PROBLEM WITH ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS

[PAUL CLEVELAND]

Hi, I've just gotten a new Dell with Vista Home Premium and installed S. Salamander 2.5, entered key and brought up the program. The problem is, the program will not let me access "Documents & Settings" to allow me to get to the Desktop. The error message is "Access Denied". I've tried signing on as Admn...no good. Tried to change Attributes for the Documents and Settings file..again, "access denied". Other than this, the program works fine (except the "30 day" nag trial window doesn't go away). Anyone have any ideas on this problem?

Paul

[zarevak]

Hi,
This is not Salamander's problem, but Vista security problem or compatibility feature. In Vista users' acounts are not under "Documents and Settings" directory, but under the "Users" directory.
BTW, there are more of these compatibility folders, that have Access Denied permissions. You cannot use them even under the Windows Explorer.

For the key to work, you have to put the keyfile under Salamander's directory under Program Files (and keyfile for PictView plugin to the PictView plugin subdirectory)

Next time please don't shout. We will try to help you even without shouting And please remember, Salamander is not yet supported under Windows Vista.

[Jan Rysavy]

Hi Paul, please import the registration key I sent you into Salamander (menu Help > Import Registration Keys), the nag screen will be gone.

Zarevak, from http://forum.altap.cz/viewtopic.php?t=1714 I understand there is possible to browse these directories when Salamander is started with "Run as Administrator"?

[zarevak]

Hey, I've just installed Windows Vista for you to check the issue

"Run as Administrator" doesn't help, because the folder has set "Deny: List folder contents" rule for Everyone. Deny rules have higher priority than Allow rules.

The Documents and Settings folder is just "shortcut" (junction point) to Users folder.

[Jan Rysavy]

Thank you for your time, our Vista is one-week-ordered now

We must prepare Salamander 2.5 for Vista ASAP.

[Paul Cleveland]

Thanks for the attention you guys are giving this problem; and thanks for a great program. I'll keep tweaking around to see if I can get anywhere with it.
Please let me know if you have any success and I'll do the same.

Best regards,

Paul

(If I am shouting, I don't mean to. I don't use boards, so don't know the "etiquette").

[Jan Rysavy]

(If I am shouting, I don't mean to. I don't use boards, so don't know the "etiquette").

No problem. The upper case & big fonts are often considered "shouting" in e-world

[zarevak]

Hi, Vista is very funny system

When you run Servant Salamander standard way (without the Run as administrator) and you Import Registration Keys, Salamander will run fine in licensed mode.
BUT:
- Other users will continue to see the nag screen
- If you now start Salamander with Run as administrator, Salamander will show you the nag screen as well


Why? Because of the security feature "Folder Virtualization" that tries to protect the Program Files folder (which you don't have write access to). Each user have special folder under his account folder with files from Program Files, that he changed in the Program Files folder. When you import your registration keys, the keys will be physicaly stored in your user account folder - for your user only (this is done transparently in Vista kernel without Salamander ever knowing enything)
When you use Run as administrator you'll get full access to the Program Files folder and you don't need any of the Folder Virtualization stuff. Your keys aren't imported to the Salamander folder and Salamander will respond with a nag screen.

To properly import your registration keys, run Salamander as administrator (using Run as administator menu item from shortcut right-click menu) and import your keys using the Help > Import Registration Keys...

[Petr Solin]

Prepared version 2.51 will go through these links (junction points), the path in panel is changed to the link target (instead of showing "access is denied" message).

[SvA]

Prepared version 2.51 will go through these links (junction points), the path in panel is changed to the link target (instead of showing "access is denied" message).

You know this is not as a Junction is supposed to work?

I don't have a Vista system here to check how Windows explorer responds to this, and why it behaves as it does. (Remember, Explorer uses those desktip.ini files, Salamander does not). From memory, I believe Explorer indeed jumps to the target, but you also can access any folders which are (virtually) below the junction by specifying the path rather than browsing to it, i.e you can access C:\Documents and Settings\All Users.

Even though C:\Documents and Settings\All Users and C:\users\All Users is one and the same directory, there are two distinct paths, which both needs to be accessible and preserved. Potentially, by way of inheritance, access rights might be different using the two distinc paths.

I recommend you do not try to make sense of this, but expose Microsofts design no matter how insane it might be.

And then you should make up your mind, whether you want to mimic Windows Explorer, which is a GUI Shell or you want to continue to provide a superb file manager.

I guess, most users will want to have an explorer replacement. I prefere the file manager.

[Petr Solin]

This patch is only for junctions with denied listing (List folder contents is denied). Explorer displays error message "Access is denied" when you try to open such junction. Salamander 2.5 also only displays this message, and prepared version 2.51 will change path in panel to target of such junction (e.g. when you try to open junction C:\Documents and Settings, panel path will change to C:\Users).

I think this is not violating any principles and it is very useful at least for users which just upgraded to Vista (my own experience).