Uninstall auto-run registry entries for all users

Question

Consider this scenario:

Inno Setup installs program named XYZ to Program Files, to be accessed by all users.
A configuration option within program XYZ allows installation of a registry value to HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run on a per-user basis, to allow users to configure application auto-start to their own preferences.
When uninstalling XYZ, if any user other than the current user has auto-run registry keys set, they will be left over and cause errors next time they log-in.

Questions

What would be the correct way to remove the appropriate registry values from all user accounts in Inno Setup?
Would it be appropriate to enumerate over the profiles in HKU and check for the keys and delete them? How would this be done in Inno Setup?
Lastly, what issues might doing this cause with roaming profiles?

The program XYZ in question is in C#, and can enumerate through the HKU's with the following code, but I'd like to handle the uninstallation completely via Inno Setup and not have to call into a separate executable on uninstall.

private static string GetSIDFromUserName(string userName)
{
    var account = new System.Security.Principal.NTAccount(userName);
    var identifier = (System.Security.Principal.SecurityIdentifier)account.Translate(typeof(System.Security.Principal.SecurityIdentifier));
    var sid = identifier.Value;
    return sid;
}

private static string[] GetAllSystemUsers()
{
    List<string> names = new List<string>();
    SelectQuery query = new SelectQuery("Win32_UserAccount");
    ManagementObjectSearcher searcher = new ManagementObjectSearcher(query);
    foreach (ManagementObject envVar in searcher.Get())
    {
        names.Add((string)envVar["Name"]);
    }
    return names.ToArray();
}

Martin Prikryl Martin Prikryl · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-28T07:11:24

To delete an autorun entry from all users, use:

procedure DeleteAutoRunEntryFromAllUsers(AutoRunValueName: string);
var
  Names: TArrayOfString;
  UserKey: string;
  AutoRunKey: string;
  I: Integer;
begin
  Log('Enumerating user keys');
  RegGetSubkeyNames(HKEY_USERS, '', Names);
  Log(Format('Found %d user keys', [GetArrayLength(Names)]));

  for I := 0 to GetArrayLength(Names)-1 do
  begin
    UserKey := Names[I];
    Log(Format('User %s', [UserKey]));
    AutoRunKey := Format('%s\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run', [UserKey]);

    if RegValueExists(HKEY_USERS, AutoRunKey, AutoRunValueName) then
    begin
      Log(Format('Deleting auto-run entry from user %s', [UserKey]));

      if RegDeleteValue(HKEY_USERS, AutoRunKey, AutoRunValueName) then
      begin
        Log(Format('Deleted auto-run entry from user %s', [UserKey]));
      end
        else
      begin
        Log(Format('Failed to delete auto-run entry from user %s', [UserKey]));
      end;
    end;
  end;
end;

Not sure about the roaming profiles.

Did you consider adding the autorun entry to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, but make the application to exit immediately based on a setting in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER (per user preference)?

This way you could just uninstall a single HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE value. The setting in HKEY_CURRENT_USER might be left behind.

Uninstall auto-run registry entries for all users

1 Answers