Existing documents are ‘read only’ with UAC set to normal/standard

[Thetios]

Existing documents are ‘read only’ with UAC set to normal/standard

Hello everybody! My first post here! I thought it would be good to start wit a lot of background information. Just skip tot the bold parts if you get tired easily. The title of this story is:

Existing documents are ‘read only’ with UAC set to normal/standard

The problem I have is with a spare machine that gets only booted every month or so to have it updated (Windows, software, AV signatures etc). It’s purpose is to have a spare machine (allmost) ready for use if my other machine needs work (hardware, or like now reinstalling it). So right now I am using it because I am modifying my primary machine.

I found out UAC was disabled (set to the lowest settings). I don’t like that at all so I set it to standard. After that It can’t modify existing documents, only open them “read-only”.

I use LibreOffice for Office documents. Paint let me open .jpg’s, and even modify them but I can’t save the changes. So it can’t be a LibreOffice issue I’d think.

No printscreen (it’s in Dutch ) but this is the LibreOffice error message:

Document file “name” is locked for editing by:

“unknown user’.

Open document read only or open a copy of the document for editing.

Some extra info:

There is NO “ .~lock.[name of document].odt#” visible, as after a LibreOffice crash while a document is open. Of if there is another user having opened documents.

So this issue is over when I move the UAC settigns from ‘standard’ to lowest, “not recommended”. Moving back to standard and “read only” for all documents occurs again with every document.

On this machine there is only ONE user (admin). There is no Guest Account enabled. When booting there is only one user visible. I have admin rights when this occurs. When there is only one account is active, context menu\properties\security (of the documents) shows 4 names for “group or user names”:

1 System
2 [name of only user]
3 “Administrators”
4 “Users”

All have the same settings (Full control, Modify, Read & execute, read, Write: Allow) exept for: 4 “Users”.
If I right click on a file, there is only an “elevated rights” option for delete and rename. On my other machines these actions come without “elevated righs”.

All files are on the local Hard Drive.

I have no idea when the UAC landed in the lowest setting or why. Be informed my pc’s have a pretty paranoid protection (forced sandboxing, hardware protected USB sticks etc etc). Just did a lot of extensive mallware scanning to be sure today.

Just ask if I forgot to tell something important. I hope there is an easy solution!

 

[Emma Yazz Aza]

Hello Thetios. This issue can be caused by a few issues. Malware being one of them. But a utility I always use are the following Registry keys that will add an Attributes editor and a takeown && icacls command to your right-click menu:
View attachment Add-Attributes-Context-Menu.reg
View attachment 4057340

Generally this solves issues for me, but you can also try Shift+right-clicking and selecting "Run as different user".

Hope this helps, hope your issue gets resolved,
Emma Yazz Aza

 

[wither 2]

This seems to be a "permissions" problem. If you right click on the .exe file; select Properties; and select Security, does your user account have Full Control?

 

[Thetios]

Thanks Emma, I will test these registry keys if (another) reinstall does not work. I have images of my Windows drives in several stages of build (layers). (like bare Windows, Windows plus drivers, applications allways in use, apllications all set up, applications I try out etc. ). So I can go back quite quickly, allthough it still takes time.
wither2: Yes. (I allready elaborated on that subject in my OP)