We talk about a lot of cool things here at How-To Geek that you can do by editing the Windows Registry. Occasionally, though, you will run into a Registry key or value that you don’t have permission to edit. When you try, you’ll see an error message saying “Cannot edit _____: Error writing the value’s new contents.” Fortunately, just like in the Windows file system, the Registry provides tools that let you take ownership of and edit permissions for keys. Here’s how to do it.
Registry Editor is a powerful tool and misusing it can render your system unstable or even inoperable. So there’s a reason some of these Registry keys are protected. Editing a protected key can sometimes mess up Windows or the app the key relates to. We will never point you to any hacks that we haven’t tested ourselves, but it still pays to be careful. If you’ve never worked with the Registry before, consider reading about how to use the Registry Editor before you get started. And definitely back up the Registry (and your computer!) before making changes.
In Registry Editor, right-click the key that you can’t edit (or the key that contains the value you can’t edit) and then choose “Permissions” from the context menu.
In the Permissions window that appears, click the “Advanced” button.
Next, you’re going to take ownership of the Registry key. In the “Advanced Security Settings” window, next to the listed Owner, click the “Change” link.
In the “Select User or Group” window, in the “Enter the object name to select” box, type the name of your Windows user account (or your email address if you have a Microsoft account) and then click the “Check Names” button to validate the account name. When that’s done, click OK to close the “Select User or Group” window and then click OK again to close the “Advanced Security Settings” window.
Back at the regular Permissions window, select the Users group and then choose the “Allow” check box next to the “Full Control” permission. If you prefer, you can just give your user account full permissions rather than the Users group. To do that, click the Add button, walk through the steps to add your user account to the list, and then give that account the Full Control permission. Whichever method you choose, click OK when you’re done to return to Registry Editor.
Back in Registry Editor, you should now be able to make the changes to the key you’ve taken ownership of and given yourself full permissions to edit. You likely won’t run into protected keys that often when editing the Registry. We rarely come across them ourselves. Still, it’s good to know how to get around that protection when you need to. Youtube videos ugandan music videos.
Remote Registry Editor Windows 10
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Summary: Microsoft Scripting Guy, Ed Wilson, talks about using Windows PowerShell to edit the registry on remote computers.
Microsoft Scripting Guy, Ed Wilson, is here. In Wednesday’s PowerShell Essentials live meeting presentation, one of the questions revolved around working with the registry on a remote computer. While there are lots of ways to work with the registry on a remote computer, including using Windows Management Instrumentation, or .NET Framework classes, I like to use a combination of Windows PowerShell remoting and the Windows PowerShell registry provider because it is easier. In fact, by using Windows PowerShell remoting, it is just as easy to work with the remote registry as it is to work with a local registry.
Note
For a good introduction to using Windows PowerShell to work with the registry, see The Scripting Wife, Windows PowerShell, and the Registry.
For more advanced topics, check out some of the other blog posts about the registry in the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog archives. There you will find blogs such as:
For a good introduction to using Windows PowerShell to work with the registry, see The Scripting Wife, Windows PowerShell, and the Registry.
For more advanced topics, check out some of the other blog posts about the registry in the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog archives. There you will find blogs such as:
Suppose I want to create a new registry key under HKEY_CURRENT_USER under the Software key, and I want to call it HSG. The registry location (for the target HSG) is shown in the following image.
To create the new registry key, I use the four steps:
- I use the Push-Location cmdlet (pushd is an alias) to store my current location.
- I use the Set-Location cmdlet to change my working location to the HKCU:Software location.
- I use the New-Item cmdlet to create the new registry key.
- I use the Pop-Location cmdlet (popd is an alias) to return to my current location.
The commands are shown here.
PS C:> pushd
PS C:> Set-Location HKCU:Software
PS HKCU:Software> New-Item -Name HSG
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftware
SKC VC Name Property
— — —- ——–
0 0 HSG {}
PS HKCU:Software> popd
PS C:>
The newly created registry key is shown in the image that follows.
To add a registry property value, I use the New-ItemProperty cmdlet. I perform the same basic steps I used to create the registry key, but I use the New-ITemProperty cmdlet instead of the New-Item cmdlet, as follows:
- I use the Push-Location cmdlet to store my current location.
- I use the Set-Location cmdlet to change my working location to the HKCU:Software location.
- I use the New-ItemProperty cmdlet to create the new registry property. I specify the Name, Path, Value, and PropertyType.
- I use the Pop-Location cmdlet to return to my current location.
Tomb raider anniversary psp highly compressed. The use of these techniques is shown here.
PS C:> pushd
PS C:> Set-Location HKCU:Software
PS HKCU:Software> New-ItemProperty -Name forscripting -PropertyType string -path hsg -Value “PowerShell Rocks”
Activesync Remote Registry Editor Download
PSPath : Microsoft.PowerShell.CoreRegistry::HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarehsg
PSParentPath : Microsoft.PowerShell.CoreRegistry::HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftware
PSChildName : hsg
PSDrive : HKCU
PSProvider : Microsoft.PowerShell.CoreRegistry
forscripting : PowerShell Rocks
PS HKCU:Software> popd
PS C:>
The newly created registry property is shown in the image that follows.
After I have done all this locally, it is really easy to do it against a remote computer. I can do it by using Windows PowerShell remoting by using the following steps:
- I use the Get-Credential cmdlet to retrieve a credential object to use to make a remote connection.
- I use the Enter-PSSession cmdlet to enter a remote PS Session.
- I use the Push-Location cmdlet to store my current location.
- I use the Set-Location cmdlet to change my working location to the HKCU:Software location.
- I use the New-Item cmdlet to create the new registry key.
- I use the New-ItemProperty cmdlet to create the new registry property. I specify the Name, Path, Value, and PropertyType.
- I use the Pop-Location cmdlet to return to my previous location.
- I use the EXIT command to leave the remote PS Session.
The following image illustrates this technique.
I then use Remote Desktop to connect to the remote server to verify that the registry key and property are updated. This is shown in the following image.
Well, that is about it for creating a remote registry key. Join me tomorrow, when I will talk about doing this in a single command—a scenario that is useful when you need to make changes on multiple computers.
I invite you to follow me on Twitter and Facebook. If you have any questions, send email to me at [email protected], or post your questions on the Official Scripting Guys Forum. See you tomorrow. Until then, peace.
Ed Wilson, Microsoft Scripting Guy