Does Visual Studio run Tests with a less privileged process?

Question

I have an application that is supposed to read from the Registry and when executing a console application my registry access works perfectly.

However when I move it over to a test this returns null:

var masterKey = Registry.LocalMachine.OpenSubKey("path_to_my_key");

So my question is:

Does Visual Studio run Tests with a less privileged process?

I tested to see what user this gave me: var x = WindowsIdentity.GetCurrent().Name; and it gives me the same as in the console application. So I am a bit confused here.

I am using MS Test Framework and the machine is Windows 2003 64 Bit.

Answer 1

It is not a security issue. It's the fact that you are running on a 64-bit operating system. 64-bit apps have a different view of HKLM\Software than 32-bit apps. 64-bit apps get the "normal" view, 32-bit apps are redirected to HKLM\Software\Wow6432Node. The EXE determines the bit-ness of the process, it will be different when mstest runs the code. 32-bit, probably.

You'll need to create the key you are trying to read in the Wow6432Node tree. Or make the regular app have the same bit-ness, Project + Properties, Build tab, Platform Target = x86. Also changeable on-the-fly with Corflags.exe.