HOW TO

Match a user profile to folders in HKEY_USERS

Last Published: April 25, 2020

Summary

Instructions provided describe how to identify which folder stored in the registry under HKEY_USERS is associated with each user profile on the computer.

Note:
The Security Identifier (SID) is a unique name (an alphanumeric character string) that is assigned by a Windows Domain controller during the login process that is used to identify a user.

This procedure enables administrators to make modifications to specific user profiles located in HKEY_USERS, mimicking those found in HKEY_CURRENT_USER when that user is logged in.

Procedure

  1. Open the Windows Registry Editor.
  2. Expand HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList.
  3. Select each folder individually and look at the ProfileImagePath key to identify the user profile associated with the selected folder:
[O-Image] Example SID key
Note:
The folder name in the above example; it is S-1-5-21-2060139532-2050374463-2073913816-1157.
  1. Expand the HKEY_USERS\<folder>. In this example, HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-2060139532-2050374463-2073913816-1157. This is that user's HKEY_CURRENT_USER. Proceed with the desired modification:
[O-Image] HKEY_USERS\

Article ID:000010572

Software:
  • ArcMap 9 x
  • ArcGIS Engine 9 x
  • ArcGIS Production Mappingx
  • ArcGIS Production Mapping 9 x
  • ArcMap 10 x
  • ArcGIS Production Mapping 10 x
  • ArcGIS Engine 10 x

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