- Programs you launch automatically use your "user privileges": guest, standard user, or administrator. You need to run them as admin to perform security-sensitive tasks.
Tip: you can also force Windows to always run some applications with elevated privileges.
- First method - right-click on the application or its shortcut while holding the Shift key: this tells Windows to show additional context menu options (hidden by default to be more user-friendly).
- In the screenshot above, notice the "Run as administrator" command's shield icon: WordPerfect Mail (third program in the listing) shows that same icon in overlay to indicate that the application in question is set to run with administrative privileges regardless of how you launch it.
- Use that same technique to run a program as another Windows user on your PC: select "Run as different user" from the Shift + right-click menu. when the prompt opens, type the exact username, his/her password in the next field, and hit Enter. This unfortunately doesn't work for some system applications like Windows Explorer, and you'll get the following error message:
- Click Yes to the UAC prompt, or click on an admin user, enter its password, and hit Enter.
- Second method - from the start menu's search field, type a program name: when it is selected (blue background highlight) press Ctrl+Shift+Enter to launch it with higher privileges (just hitting Enter opens it "normally", as if you had clicked on its icon).
- To run an elevated prompt: type "cmd" in the start menu's search field and hit Ctrl+Shift+Enter.
Note: this method doesn't work from the Run dialog (Windows key + R). So, with the classic start menu enabled in Windows Vista, you have to use the Shift + Right click approach).
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