>As an example, Quickbooks saves it's data files in the "Program Files\Intuit\Quickbooks" folder. Of course, you can change this but that's there default and I'm sure there are lots of Quickbooks users that have their data files sitting right there.

What's this problem exactly?

Just about any existing application does this and this will work just fine in the default Vista installation which allows the local users access there.

(checking...)

Hmmmm... this is a bit odd. I just checked my Program Files folder permissions and there's no Authenticated Users group. This group exists and has most but not all locations on the drive marked with full access. All my private off root folders have it.

However, Program Files does not, which seems really odd.

In a default Vista install the user will show up as a 'pseudo' Administrator and will have full rights to the program files folder (which is I suppose why this works for me here).

I suspect this will still change. I just can't see that MS would lock down Program Files in this way which would be a complete upgrade disaster. 90% of applications out there require some sort of write access in the installation folder if for nothing else than writing minimal configuration data.


+++ Rick ---