Bob Young wrote:
PowerUser is different from Admin, Admin is the equevelent of root in the Linux/Unix world, PowerUser is not. The primary and most important difference is the ability to *write* to the registry, It's perfectly safe to routinely log on as a PowerUser, as PowerUsers can *not* write to registry keys that affect the entire system, while Admin users can write to *any* registry key.
I'm not sure if this is true. Anyway, PowerUser has the ability to install sw (even system patches!), alter executables and system files! PowerUser can write to C:\ProgramFiles, or C:\Windows, and that is exactly, what a virus need to spread itself. Not many viruses can hide their code in registry (that is just equivalent to /etc in unix-world), mostly they attach themselves to some exe/sys file, or overwrite them... So, if you start a virus-infected program as a PowerUser, there are perfect conditions for spreading infection. If there were some virus for linux, and you start it as a normal user, it can not alter executables in /usr or /sbin, because user does not have write access to them. Such a virus could infect only *your* files. I'd say PowerUser is something between a restricted user, and admin. Jarry -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
