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Vista - uac incorrectly identifies nsis installers

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Old 09-16-2006   #1 (permalink)
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uac incorrectly identifies nsis installers

I realize this isn't exactly the best place for bug reports, but it's the
best one I could find. If there's a better place, please let me know and I'll
post my bug report there.

I'm the lead developer of NSIS, a software package used to create installers
for Windows.

Vista added a new feature that asks the user for an administrator password
for programs requiring administrator privileges. The application specify that
in its manifest, but Vista also automatically identifies certain types of
programs. One of these is installers created using NSIS.

The problem is with the method used to identify those installers. There are
two methods as far as I can tell. The first looks for a special signature
used in the header of every installer. The second, the problematic one, is
looking for "Nullsoft.NSIS" in the name attribute of the assemblyIdentity tag
in the xml manifest. That creates a false positive as every application in
the NSIS package has that prefix in the name attribute. Installers share that
prefix, but have ".exehead" suffix. This causes utilities used to create
installers that require no administrator privileges to be identified as
programs that require privilege escalation. This renders most of the
applications in the NSIS package unusable for standard users.

A similar problems occurs with Inno Setup and its compilers, but I don't
know because of which string.

Please fix it so it'd search for Nullsoft.NSIS.exehead and not just
Nullsoft.NSIS.

----------------
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http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com...vista.security

My System SpecsSystem Spec
Old 10-05-2007   #2 (permalink)
chuco


 
 

RE: uac incorrectly identifies nsis installers

is this the reason i'm having problems installing my kapersky antivirus? what
can i do if it is?

"Amir Szekely" wrote:
Quote:

> I realize this isn't exactly the best place for bug reports, but it's the
> best one I could find. If there's a better place, please let me know and I'll
> post my bug report there.
>
> I'm the lead developer of NSIS, a software package used to create installers
> for Windows.
>
> Vista added a new feature that asks the user for an administrator password
> for programs requiring administrator privileges. The application specify that
> in its manifest, but Vista also automatically identifies certain types of
> programs. One of these is installers created using NSIS.
>
> The problem is with the method used to identify those installers. There are
> two methods as far as I can tell. The first looks for a special signature
> used in the header of every installer. The second, the problematic one, is
> looking for "Nullsoft.NSIS" in the name attribute of the assemblyIdentity tag
> in the xml manifest. That creates a false positive as every application in
> the NSIS package has that prefix in the name attribute. Installers share that
> prefix, but have ".exehead" suffix. This causes utilities used to create
> installers that require no administrator privileges to be identified as
> programs that require privilege escalation. This renders most of the
> applications in the NSIS package unusable for standard users.
>
> A similar problems occurs with Inno Setup and its compilers, but I don't
> know because of which string.
>
> Please fix it so it'd search for Nullsoft.NSIS.exehead and not just
> Nullsoft.NSIS.
>
> ----------------
> This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to the
> suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click the "I
> Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see the button, follow this
> link to open the suggestion in the Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then
> click "I Agree" in the message pane.
>
> http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com...vista.security
My System SpecsSystem Spec
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