The long and the short of it is that, as a general rule, I always leave UAC enabled on Windows and never run as Administrator by default. But I do have scripts that need to run as administrator from time to time.
Rather than launching PowerShell “as Administrator” (which would result in me running other scripts as administrator – because it would be convenient) I have put together the following chunk of script :
# Get the ID and security principal of the current user account
$myWindowsID=[System.Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent()
$myWindowsPrincipal=new-object System.Security.Principal.WindowsPrincipal($myWindowsID)
# Get the security principal for the Administrator role
$adminRole=[System.Security.Principal.WindowsBuiltInRole]::Administrator
# Check to see if we are currently running "as Administrator"
if ($myWindowsPrincipal.IsInRole($adminRole))
{
# We are running "as Administrator" - so change the title and background color to indicate this
$Host.UI.RawUI.WindowTitle = $myInvocation.MyCommand.Definition + "(Elevated)"
$Host.UI.RawUI.BackgroundColor = "DarkBlue"
clear-host
}
else
{
# We are not running "as Administrator" - so relaunch as administrator
# Create a new process object that starts PowerShell
$newProcess = new-object System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo "PowerShell";
# Specify the current script path and name as a parameter
$newProcess.Arguments = $myInvocation.MyCommand.Definition;
# Indicate that the process should be elevated
$newProcess.Verb = "runas";
# Start the new process
[System.Diagnostics.Process]::Start($newProcess);
# Exit from the current, unelevated, process
exit
}
# Run your code that needs to be elevated here
Write-Host -NoNewLine "Press any key to continue..."
$null = $Host.UI.RawUI.ReadKey("NoEcho,IncludeKeyDown")Cheers,
Ben
Source : Virtual PC Guy's WebLog
