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For some reason, multiple laptops on our wifi network often lose the ability to print to a device attached to a server on the network. Restarting the Print Spooler on each laptop fixes the issue. However, restarting the Windows Print Spooler service (via either services.msc or via the net start/stop command) requires administrative privileges.

Is there a way to allow standard users to restart their local print spooler service without requiring elevation or administrative privileges? For example, via a policy change?

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  • try secpol.msc local security policy i beleive they changed the shortcut in Win7/Vista but im sure it would be easyt o find – dc5553 May 1 '12 at 16:16
  • The sc command allows you to change the permissions on a service. I believe the options are sdshow and sdset. The SDDL syntax is documented here: msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/… – Harry Johnston May 2 '12 at 2:35
  • sc sdshow spooler shows service permissions. Need to decipher SDDL syntax to make changes. – sean e May 2 '12 at 15:05
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I ended up using Method 3 at How to grant users rights to manage services in Windows 2000.

  1. Download and install SubInACL.exe
  2. run "C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\subinacl" /service Spooler /grant=<username>=TO

SubInACL works on Windows 7.

The T grant parameter is for start service access and the O parameter is stop service access.

Now <username> can:

  • run sc stop Spooler and sc start Spooler
  • run net stop "Print Spooler" and net start "Print Spooler"
  • use the Restart button on the Print Spooler item in services.msc
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  • 1
    Awesome. As an admin, I've been remoting to a user's PC to do this over and over and over and... but no more, thanks to you! – ThisClark Mar 10 '15 at 16:14
  • Whoops... when I tried this (elevated) for the service MySQL I got "MySQL - OpenService Error : 5 Access is denied" – mike rodent Mar 14 '16 at 21:16
  • This does not work. It makes no difference. Standard users still get System error 5 has occurred and Access is denied. I'm running Windows 10 though. – Gary Sheppard Nov 5 '17 at 12:16
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    I simplified it by granting access to the group "everyone" and it worked great, including on Windows 10. Note: don't include the quotes. – AnthonyVO Feb 14 '18 at 19:14
1

Try: SetACL: Windows ACL management http://sourceforge.net/projects/setacl/

SetACL + GUI = SetACL Studio http://helgeklein.com/setacl-studio/

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0

An old blog entry has the correct solution (look under "Allow All Authenticated Users to Restart Service"). Run the following once in an elevated command prompt:

sc sdset Spooler "D:AR(A;;CCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWO;;;BA) (A;;LCRPWP;;;AU)(A;;CCLCSWLOCRRC;;;IU)(A;;CCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWO;;;SY) S:(AU;FA;CCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWO;;;WD)"

Replace Spooler with the name of whatever service users need to restart. Use the rest of the line exactly as-is. I don't know what it means, but it works. :-)

After a few seconds, you will see this response:

[SC] SetServiceObjectSecurity SUCCESS

Now all authenticated users can restart the service.

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