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Removing the administrator requirement from applications

Posted: 23 Feb 2022, 18:32
by K4sum1
I was trying to find a way to remove the administrator requirement from an application, but I couldn't figure out how. There was nothing online about, but after some help from blueclouds8666, I was able to figure it out.

Note: This might not work on every application. There are different ways of asking for administrator, and some applications may just need administrator permissions.

Note 2: Ensure that this is unchecked before trying this. It could just be that simple.

1: Open the application up in a hex editor. I use HXD, but if you want something open source wxHexEditor works as well.
2: Search for "requestedExecutionLevel", you should see something similar to "<requestedExecutionLevel level="requireAdministrator">"
3: Replace "requireAdministrator" with "asInvoker"
4: Replace the extra space with .'s, or 0's if you use the hex field. It should look like this if you did it right.
5: Save the application and test it.

If it runs, the application works and can be used without administrator permissions.

Some reasons why you might want to do this are
1: The program is a bit sketch, and you don't like it having administrator permissions.
2: You use a limited account, and don't want to type your password in every time.
3: You know it doesn't need administrator permissions and want to avoid the UAC prompt without disabling UAC.