3 ms·

I understand that Microsoft might have felt they were backed into a corner on this issue but... This is a horrifically bad thing to do. When a user can change

I understand that Microsoft might have felt they were backed into a corner on this issue but... This is a horrifically bad thing to do. When a user can change an option as simply as selecting a checkbox and that option doesn't simply cause some actions to return a clear error but instead causes those actions to dramatically change runtime behavior without any change in API behavior, that's bad, bad news. Deploying and supporting software for hundreds of thousands of customers is really annoying and this type of obscure, broad reaching option is the biggest reason why. Every week I receive a bug report from a customer that turns out to be a minor setting I've never heard of, preventing installation, or blocking some system resource, or changing file system behaviors, or network behaviors etc. If there's a clear error code that reports what option is blocked and why, then it's annoying but manageable. When there's a massive change in behavior but nothing captured in any log, crash report, etc... then AAAARRRGG!!

sudioStudio64 11y ago
Most of these settings can be controlled by group policy or registry settings. This really just illustrates how serious they are about not breaking compatibility with the widest variety of software. If you are having issues with users being able to change things like this on modern windows systems you need to look into removing their permissions on the host. Since XP most of the kinds of settings like the one described in this old article require admin permissions to change. Maybe that's not an option for you...I get that. You are right, though, about supporting lots of users...there are always going to be local config that makes that hard when they can change so much of the system. The upcoming universal platform makes that less likely, but it's definitely a hard problem.
- sukilot 11y ago
  OK how do I detect that the bug is caused by someone changing one of a thousand apparently unrelated settings that doesnt report its interference? I don't want to turn off all customizations that users may need.

sudioStudio64 11y ago

Most of these settings can be controlled by group policy or registry settings. This really just illustrates how serious they are about not breaking compatibility with the widest variety of software. If you are having issues with users being able to change things like this on modern windows systems you need to look into removing their permissions on the host. Since XP most of the kinds of settings like the one described in this old article require admin permissions to change. Maybe that's not an option for you...I get that. You are right, though, about supporting lots of users...there are always going to be local config that makes that hard when they can change so much of the system. The upcoming universal platform makes that less likely, but it's definitely a hard problem.

sukilot 11y ago
OK how do I detect that the bug is caused by someone changing one of a thousand apparently unrelated settings that doesnt report its interference? I don't want to turn off all customizations that users may need.