Solved Access denied when editing .ini files

[pjfarr]

All of a sudden when I'm trying to save an edited .ini file in a program folder (in C:\Program Files) I get blocked by an Access Denied message. First, on making the changes in the .ini using Notepad and then clicking File > Save, I get the "Save As" dialog instead. But even then when I click Save it will say I don't have permission to save in this location and to contact an administrator (which is me).

I have edited these same files in these same locations dozens of times without a problem before. This is something new that starting just this morning. System restore didn't help.

Anyone have any experience with this sort of thing?

 

[pbcopter]

Open notepad at an elevated level (right click on notepad and select Run as administrator)
Then import the file you are editing, edit and then save.

 

[pjfarr]

Yes, that does work. Also copying the file to the desktop, editing, saving and moving it back works. However, I didn't have to do any of that before. I could change and save the file directly in its native folder. Something has changed in my security settings apparently. I would like to sleuth it out if possible.

 

[pbcopter]

In all my Windows 7 systems, notepad cannot save to any system folder without running elevated.
If it worked for you before, then something had changed from the default permissions.

 

[pjfarr]

I think I've managed to tie it to the UAC settings, with a little more investigation.

I turned off UAC a long time ago. Within the first 24 hours of test driving W7, actually. I went from XP to 7, skipping Vista, so a hadn't been initiated into the constant warnings and permission issues. I'm more of an advanced user, not an expert exactly, but I do a lot of tweaking. Having to click 4 times to delete something from the Start Menu? Seriously? (Right-click > delete > "Are you sure?" > "Yes" > "You need administrator privileges to make this change. Click 'continue' to complete the action' > "Continue"). Yeah, UAC was disabled pretty quickly.

Anyway, in delving deeper into this particular issue, I checked the UAC setting to see if it had mysteriously reasserted itself (in that way Windows has of doing things like that). It was still off. I turned it on again, then off, then rebooted and I'm now able to edit and save any .ini's in their native folders once again without any hassle.

 

[Kari]

In all my Windows 7 systems, notepad cannot save to any system folder without running elevated.
If it worked for you before, then something had changed from the default permissions.

Correct. By default, UAC prevents user to save to system folders. Simple workaround is to run apps elevated as already mentioned in this thread, for instance opening Notepad elevated when files in Windows folder must be edited, or opening 7-Zip elevated if a zipped file must be extracted to Program Fileds folder.

Kari