Disable background geoprocessing in ArcGIS Desktop by editing the registry

Summary

In certain circumstances, such as Citrix environments, system administrators may want to have background processing disabled for ArcGIS Desktop by default.

There is no configuration option available to disable background processing during installation of ArcGIS for Desktop.

You can control whether tools execute in the foreground or background by clicking Geoprocessing > Geoprocessing Options on the Standard toolbar.

Procedure

Warning:
Manually deleting files and registry keys while ArcGIS products are still installed is not recommended. Doing so can adversely impact the current installation as well as any future installations. Consult the systems administrator before altering the registry or modifying installed files. In many instances, performing these operations can result in irreversible changes to the computer and can adversely affect current and future installations.

System administrators can disable background processing during rollout by creating a registry key as below.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\ESRI\<Desktop10.7>\ArcToolbox\Settings]
"RunInBackground"=dword:00000000