Windows uninstaller isn't running as Admin

Question

I've made a custom installer / uninstaller. I register the uninstaller with the Windows Registry as described in the MSDN Library, Chaper 2. Install/Uninstall.

Namely, this means registering uninstall.exe as the UninstallString. It works, in that it runs my uninstaller. The problem is that it doesn't invoke as admin. I've set uninstall.exe's manifest to require admin using mt, and if you double-click it from explorer, it will automatically request admin as desired.

So the question is, what's the magic flag I need to set in the registry to get the Windows Add / Remove Programs dialog to run my uninstaller as admin?

Answer 1

You could add checking for admin privileges inside your uninstall program. Check this question for more ideas on how to do it. The easiest of the mentioned options is using a shortcut to your program and ticking the option "Run as administrator".

The other solution is to make a registry entry inside HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Layers and add a REG_SZ path to your executable as the value, and "RUNASADMIN" as data.

More info in this answer here.