15.2. AccountsTo see what accounts are already on your PC, choose Start Control Panel, and then, under User Accounts and Family Safety, click "Add or remove user accounts." You're asked to authenticate yourself (Section 6.3), and then you see a list of existing accounts (Figure 15-1).
If you see more than one account herenot just yoursthen one of these situations probably applies:
If you're new at this, on the other hand, there's probably just one account listed here: yours. This is the account that Windows created when you first installed it. 15.2.1. Administrator vs. Standard AccountsIt's important to understand the phrase that appears just under each person's name. On your own personal PC, the word Administrator probably appears underneath yours. Because you're the person who installed Vista, the PC assumes that you're one of its administrators the technical wizards who will be in charge of it. You're the teacher, the parent, the resident guru. You're the one who will maintain this PC and who will be permitted to make system-wide changes to it. You'll find settings all over Windows that only people with Administrator accounts can change. For example, only an administrator is allowed to create or delete accounts and passwords on the PC; install new programs (and certain hardware components ); make changes to certain Control Panel programs that are off limits to non-administrators; and see and manipulate any file on the machine. There's another kind of account, too, for people who don't have to make those kinds of changes: the Standard account. Now, until Vista came along, people doled out Administrator accounts pretty freely . You know: the parents got Administrator accounts, the kids got Standard ones. The trouble is, an Administrator account itself is a kind of security hole. Any time you're logged in with this kind of account, any nasty software you may have caught from the Internet is also , in effect, logged inand can make changes to important underlying settings on your PC, just the way a human administrator can. Put another way: If a Standard account holder manages to download a computer virus, its infection will be confined to his account. If an administrator catches a virus, on the other hand, every file on the machine is at risk. In Vista, therefore, Microsoft recommends that everyone use Standard accountseven you, the wise master and owner of the computer! So how are you supposed to make important Control Panel changes, install new programs, and so on? That's a lot easier in Vista. Using a Standard account no longer means that you can't make important changes. In fact, you can do just about everything that an Administrator account can if you know the name and password of a true Administrator account. Note: Every Vista PC can (and must) keep at least one Administrator account on hand, even if you rarely log in with that account. Whenever you try to make a big change, you're asked to authenticate yourself. As described on Section 6.3, that means supplying an Administrator account's name and password, even though you, the currently logged-in person, are a lowly Standard account holder (Figure 15-2).
The idea is that if you really are a Standard account holder, you can call over an Administrator to approve the change you're making. And if you really are the PC's owner, you know the Administrator account's password anyway, so it's no big deal. Now, making broad changes to a PC when you're an Administrator still presents you with those " prove yourself worthy" authentication dialog boxes. The only difference is that you, the Administrator, can click Continue to bypass them, rather than having to type in a name and password. You'll have to weigh this security/convenience tradeoff . But you've been warned : the least vulnerable PC is one where everyone uses Standard accounts. 15.2.2. Adding an AccountOnce you've opened the Manage Accounts window in the Control Panel, it's easy to create a new account: click the "Create a new account" link shown in Figure 15-1. (You see this link only if you are, in fact, an administrator.) The next screen asks you to name the account and choose an account type: Administrator or Standard. When you're finished with the settings, click Create Account (or press Enter). After a moment, you return to the User Accounts screen (Figure 15-1), where the new person's name joins whatever names were already there. You can continue adding new accounts forever or until your hard drive is full, whichever comes first. 15.2.3. Editing an AccountAlthough the process of creating a new account is swift and simple, it doesn't offer you much in the way of flexibility. You don't even have a chance to specify the new person's password, let alone the tiny picture that appears next to the person's name and at the top of the Start menu (rubber ducky, flower, or whatever). That's why the next step in creating an account is usually editing the one you just set up. To do so, once you've returned to the main User Accounts screen (Figure 15-1), click the name or icon of the freshly created account. You arrive at the screen shown at the top in Figure 15-3, whereif you are an administratoryou can choose from any of these options:
You're free to make any of these changes to any account at any time; you don't have to do it immediately after creating the account. Tip: The Start menu offers a big, fat shortcut to the Edit Account dialog box shown in Figure 15-3: just click your picture at the top of the open Start menu. 15.2.4. The Forgotten Password DiskAs described above, Windows contains a handy hint mechanism for helping you recall your password if you've forgotten it. But what if, having walked into a low-hanging branch, you've completely forgotten both your password and the correct interpretation of your hint? In that disastrous situation, your entire world of work and email would be locked inside the computer forever. (Yes, an administrator could issue you a new passwordbut as noted in the box on the facing page, you'd lose all your secondary passwords in the process.) Fortunately, Windows offers a clever solution-in-advance: the Password Reset Disk. It's a CD or USB flash drive (not a floppy, as in Windows XP) that you can use like a physical key to unlock your account, in the event of a forgotten password. The catch is, you have to make this disk now , while you still remember your password. To create this disk, insert a blank CD or a USB flash drive. Open/ the Start menu and click your picture (top right). The "Make changes to your account" window opens (Figure 15-3). The first link in the task pane says, "Create a password reset disk." Click that to open the Forgotten Password Wizard. Click through it, supplying your current password when you're asked for it. When you click Finish, remove the CD or flash drive. Label it, and don't lose it! Tip: Behind the scenes, Vista saves a file onto the CD or flash drive called userkey.psw . You can guess what that is. When the day comes that you can't remember your password, leave the Password box empty and hit Enter. You'll wind up back at the login screen; this time, in addition to your password hint, you'll see a link called "Reset password." Insert your Password Reset CD or flash drive and then click that link. A Password Reset Wizard now helps you create a new password (and a new hint to remind you of it). You're in. Even though you now have a new password, your existing Password Reset Disk is still good. Keep it in a drawer somewhere, for use the next time you experience a temporarily blank brain. 15.2.5. Deleting AccountsIt happenssomebody graduates, somebody gets fired , somebody dumps you. Sooner or later, you may need to delete an account from your PC. To delete a user account, open the User Accounts program, click the appropriate account name, and then click "Delete the account." Windows now asks you if you want to preserve the contents of this person's Documents folder. If you click the Keep Files button, you'll find a new folder, named for the dearly departed, on your desktop. (As noted in the dialog box, only the documents, the contents of the desktop, and the Documents folder are preservedbut not programs, email, or even Web favorites.) If that person ever returns to your life, you can create a new account for him and copy these files into the appropriate folder locations. If you click the Delete Files button, on the other hand, the documents are gone forever. |