Restricting User Rights | How to Wow: Photoshop for the Web

One of the surest ways to protect your computer from either malicious or accidental damage is to assign everyone who uses the computer to the Standard group, and allow only one Administrator account for use in executing system changes. Often, however, several people are assigned administrative accounts. You can easily switch those administrative accounts to the Standard group. If you want to further restrict access to specific people, don't assign them user accounts at all; instead, ask them to sign in to the Guest account. Of course, you'll need to activate the Guest account before anyone can use it.

Change the Type of Access

Click the Start button, and click your account picture to display the User Accounts window for your account. Click Manage Another Account to display the Manage Accounts window.

Click the account you want to manage.

In the Change An Account window, click Change The Account Type.

Select the Standard User option if it isn't already selected.

Click the Change Account Type button.

Use the Guest Account

In the Change An Account window, click Manage Another Account to display the Manage Accounts window.

Click the Guest account.

In the Turn On Guest Account window, click the Turn On button.

Close the Manage Accounts window when you've finished.

If necessary, inform those who want to use the computer that they don't have Standard access, and advise them to log on using the Guest account.

See Also

"Know Your Rights" on page 278 for information about the different types of user accounts.

Tip

If you'd prefer someone who has an account on the computer to log on as a Guest, you can easily delete his or her account. To do so, click the account in the Manage Accounts window, and click Delete The Account. Windows Vista will give you the options of saving any of this user's files (but not their e-mails) to a folder on the Desktop that's accessible only by the person who deleted the account, or of deleting the files.