Windows Vista: How to execute a .exe program in the cmd “As Administrator”

Question

Yes, that's it. I need to run a program .exe in the dos cmd line and it needs to run like when you right button and select "run as an administrator"

Answer 1

Windows has a "runas" command that acts a bit like sudo does in Unix-y systems. Try typing "runas /?" in your command prompt.

Answer 2

If you run cmd itself as administrator, everything else you run from there will also. I just setup a shortcut to the command prompt that opens as administrator. Everything from there is good to go.

Answer 3

I have used a duo of .cmd & .vbs script called elevate, it works fine for my needs. All you need is to type

elevate [command]

from Start > Run or from the command line, and it will run the command with administrator privileges. Hope it helps!

Here is elevate.cmd:

:: //***************************************************************************
:: // ***** Script Header *****
:: //
:: // File:      Elevate.cmd
:: //
:: // Additional files required:  Elevate.vbs
:: //
:: // Purpose:   To provide a command line method of launching applications that
:: //            prompt for elevation (Run as Administrator) on Windows Vista.
:: //
:: // Usage:     elevate.cmd application <application arguments>
:: //
:: // Version:   1.0.0
:: // Date :     01/02/2007
:: //
:: // History:
:: // 1.0.0   01/02/2007  Created initial version.
:: //
:: // ***** End Header *****
:: //***************************************************************************


@echo off

:: Pass raw command line agruments and first argument to Elevate.vbs
:: through environment variables.
set ELEVATE_CMDLINE=%*
set ELEVATE_APP=%1

start wscript //nologo "%~dpn0.vbs" %*

and elevate.vbs:

' //***************************************************************************
' // ***** Script Header *****
' //
' // File:      Elevate.vbs
' //
' // Additional files required:  Elevate.cmd
' //
' // Purpose:   To provide a command line method of launching applications that
' //            prompt for elevation (Run as Administrator) on Windows Vista.
' //
' // Usage:     (Not used directly.  Launched from Elevate.cmd.)
' //
' // Version:   1.0.1
' // Date :     01/03/2007
' //
' // History:
' // 1.0.0   01/02/2007  Created initial version.
' // 1.0.1   01/03/2007  Added detailed usage output.
' //
' // ***** End Header *****
' //***************************************************************************


Set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
Set objWshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
Set objWshProcessEnv = objWshShell.Environment("PROCESS")

' Get raw command line agruments and first argument from Elevate.cmd passed
' in through environment variables.
strCommandLine = objWshProcessEnv("ELEVATE_CMDLINE")
strApplication = objWshProcessEnv("ELEVATE_APP")
strArguments = Right(strCommandLine, (Len(strCommandLine) - Len(strApplication)))

If (WScript.Arguments.Count >= 1) Then
    strFlag = WScript.Arguments(0)
    If (strFlag = "") OR (strFlag="help") OR (strFlag="/h") OR (strFlag="\h") OR (strFlag="-h") _
        OR (strFlag = "\?") OR (strFlag = "/?") OR (strFlag = "-?") OR (strFlag="h") _
        OR (strFlag = "?") Then
        DisplayUsage
        WScript.Quit
    Else
        objShell.ShellExecute strApplication, strArguments, "", "runas"
    End If
Else
    DisplayUsage
    WScript.Quit
End If


Sub DisplayUsage

    WScript.Echo "Elevate - Elevation Command Line Tool for Windows Vista" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Purpose:" & vbCrLf & _
                 "--------" & vbCrLf & _
                 "To launch applications that prompt for elevation (i.e. Run as Administrator)" & vbCrLf & _
                 "from the command line, a script, or the Run box." & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Usage:   " & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate application <arguments>" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Sample usage:" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate notepad ""C:\Windows\win.ini""" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate cmd /k cd ""C:\Program Files""" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate powershell -NoExit -Command Set-Location 'C:\Windows'" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Usage with scripts: When using the elevate command with scripts such as" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Windows Script Host or Windows PowerShell scripts, you should specify" & vbCrLf & _
                 "the script host executable (i.e., wscript, cscript, powershell) as the " & vbCrLf & _
                 "application." & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "Sample usage with scripts:" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate wscript ""C:\windows\system32\slmgr.vbs"" –dli" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate powershell -NoExit -Command & 'C:\Temp\Test.ps1'" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "The elevate command consists of the following files:" & vbCrLf & _
                 "" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate.cmd" & vbCrLf & _
                 "    elevate.vbs" & vbCrLf

End Sub

Answer 4

You have to use the RunAs.exe command.

Here are some instructions: http://www.softtreetech.com/24x7/archive/53.htm

Answer 5

You could also Press Windows Key, type CMD, this will list cmd in programs, right click it -> Properties -> Compatibility -> Run this program as an administrator

This will always run as Admin.

Answer 6

Since someone posted the VBS equivalent, here's a Invoke-Admin function for PowerShell

function Invoke-Admin() {
param ( [string]$program = $(throw "Please specify a program" ),
        [string]$argumentString = "",
        [switch]$waitForExit )

$psi = new-object "Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo"
$psi.FileName = $program 
$psi.Arguments = $argumentString
$psi.Verb = "runas"
$proc = [Diagnostics.Process]::Start($psi)
if ( $waitForExit ) {
    $proc.WaitForExit();
}

}

Answer 7

In short:

• Click/press Start, then CTRL + SHIFT and ENTER. Confirm.

In detail:

1. Press the Start button Type "cmd" (without quotes) immediatly(1)
2. Hold CTRL and SHIFT
3. Press ENTER
4. Confirm the Windows Vista UAC dialog box

(1) Immediatly means typing it in the Search box, not in the Run box.

Answer 8

I created a link from %SystemRoot%\system32\cmd.exe in the documents folder called cmd.lnk and then I clicked properties, advanced, then clicked always run as administrator or whatever. Then I removed the file %SystemRoot%\system32\cmd.exe from the index by right clicking on the cmd.exe program, going to properties, clicking advanced, and then unchecking Index this file for faster searching. I went to the start menu and typed indexing options and I am now rebuilding the index. It is going to take a while but I am almost positive that once the rebuild is finished, when I type cmd from now on, it will find the cmd link in the my documents folder and run that with administrative privileges and not show the cmd.exe from the system32 folder. Hope this helps.

Spork

Answer 9

Make a ambika.vbs (filename.vbs) file with the following contents:

Set objShell = CreateObject(“Shell.Application”)
Set objWshShell = WScript.CreateObject(“WScript.Shell”)
Set objWshProcessEnv = objWshShell.Environment(“PROCESS”)

objShell.ShellExecute “C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe”, “/k”, “”, “runas”