Printing from Win32 application - 22H2 AND 24H2 - revived old thread

Question

Since this thread is locked and can't be commented on any longer, I'm starting a new thread as I've run into an issue related to this.

Printing from Win32 application - new after installing 22h2 update - Microsoft Community

The issue I've discovered is that, while the registry change referenced in that thread DOES WORK, for me it doesn't work unless the user is a local administrator on the workstation. I went to a workstation, and logged in as a local administrator and added the registry settings (although I did change the location to HKLM rather than HKCU) - even went so far as to check the permissions on the registry key created to make sure the "everyone" group had READ access to the key.

But the only way I can get these settings to work is if I give the users local admin rights on the workstation.

For security reasons, I obviously don't want to give out local admin rights to users just so that they can access the legacy print dialog box (which they are used to seeing).

Am I missing something? Why would this require local admin rights for this to work?

***moved from Windows / Windows 11 / Settings***

Answer 1

Hello,

You might want to consider setting the registry key under HKCU for each individual user instead. This approach avoids the need to grant local administrator rights.

Regarding your question, "Why would this require local admin rights to work?"

I find below relevant information:

Even though you've granted the "Everyone" group read access to the new registry key, certain actions may still need elevated permissions, particularly when they involve altering system resources or engaging with protected components of the operating system. Additionally, Windows User Account Control (UAC) could be restricting non-admin users from accessing or modifying specific registry keys, which might explain why local admin rights seem necessary for the changes to take effect.

I hope this information helps.

Best regards,

Karlie Weng

Answer 2

@Karlie Weng -

I appreciate your response, but setting the key under HKCU just doesn't seem like a viable solution given that the machines that I personally have in question are communal machines and have several different people logging into them on a daily basis. Especially for something as simple as changing the print dialog box (as what's referenced in the link I shared in my original post)

Our original problem is that we have an old Win32 application that our business uses and when the users try and print a report from it, they get the new unified print dialog in Windows 11 and they believe there's a problem with the report because the Unified Print Dialog box shows "print preview isn't available because your app doesn't support it", or something similar to that. We simply want to revert back to the Legacy Print dialog box because it's what they are used to seeing when they print their reports and it will avoid a lot of confusion, and help desk calls!

Answer 3

After researching online, I found that modifying the registry is the only way to enable the Legacy Print dialog. For your situation, using a logon script could be a simple solution.

This way, the script will automatically apply the needed registry changes when each user logs in, ensuring the Legacy Print dialog is always enabled without manual setup.

Answer 4

If we add that to a logon script, would that registry setting get applied the first time each user logs into that workstation, or is that something that would get applied every single time a user logs in, and gets reverted when the user logs out?

Answer 5

By default, if your logon script contains instructions to add registry settings, these settings will be attempted to be applied each time the user logs in.

Registry settings applied at logon will not be reverted when the user logs out.