Thread: Create Administrator Mode Shortcuts without UAC Prompts in Windows Vista

One of the most talked on annoyances in Windows Vista are the UAC prompts that continuously pop up when you attempt to make changes in the system. It is especially trying if you often need a particular tool that requires administrator mode in order to run. Fortunately there is a simple hack you can do to an administrator mode shortcut does not prompt for UAC to create.

This works by setting up a scheduled task to run the application in Administrator mode, and then setting up a separate shortcut that tells the scheduled task to run. If that sounds tricky, it is really not just follow through the instructions below.

Create the Scheduled Task Item

Open Task Scheduler with start menu search box (generally you can just type task), and next on the right-hand side click the “Create Task” link:



The first thing you require to do is provide the task a short, easy name, if possible not including any spaces in it. Then check the box for “Run with highest privileges”.



Now change to the Actions tab, click the New button, and then browse down to the application that you are attempting to Run.



Close the dialog by clicking the OK button, which should make the new task in the list. You can right click it and choose "Run" at this point, just to make confident that the application launches the technique you expect.



At this point our scheduled tasks setup is complete, so you are able to close out of that if you want as long as you memorize the name that you used for the task.

Create the Shortcut to Start the Task

Right-click anyplace on the desktop and choose New \ Shortcut from the menu.

Now here is where the real magic happens, we ask for a command that will run the scheduled task to add, in passing the name of the task we used. As you can see, I used runregedit as the name for the task.



Make confident you enter the task name like this, swap the capitalized letters for the name of your task. (It is not case sensitive)

schtasks /run /tn “TASKNAMEINQUOTES”

Now give your shortcut some useful name, and then click next to create it.



At this point you should have a shortcut that will launch the application in administrator mode.



But we can squeeze it a bit more open up the properties for the shortcut, and then change the Run drop-down to “Minimized” (to hide the schtasks command line utility), and then click on Change Icon.



The easiest thing to perform is just browse down to the application that you are opening with the shortcut and you should see the icons for the application itself.



So now you have a nice looking icon that launches an application in Administrator mode with no prompts at all.