Windows Vista UAC's annoyance is a feature

Posted on Friday, April 18 2008 @ 6:31 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
Last week at the RSA 2008 confab in San Francisco, Microsoft admitted that the User Account Control of Windows Vista was designed to annoy:
. Microsoft's David Cross came out and said so: "The reason we put UAC into the platform was to annoy users. I'm serious," said Cross.

This isn't a total revelation. UAC was designed to get in your face; it's all about that "hey, you sure about that bauddy?", second-guessing thing. It's a less intimidating, less entertaining version of Clint Eastwood saying, "do you feel lucky, punk?" All this because you wanted to do something unimpressive like view all running processes on your system or install GAIM.

What makes UAC annoying is that it's a half-breed of sorts. UAC is not a security barrier, which is one of the reasons why users hate it: they don't see the point in a process elevation alert box that asks you to click "OK," as opposed to inputting a password when you're an admin.
Source: ARS Technica


About the Author

Thomas De Maesschalck

Thomas has been messing with computer since early childhood and firmly believes the Internet is the best thing since sliced bread. Enjoys playing with new tech, is fascinated by science, and passionate about financial markets. When not behind a computer, he can be found with running shoes on or lifting heavy weights in the weight room.



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