Installation behavior for unsigned controls. Installation behavior for controls signed with an untrusted cert. Installation behavior for controls signed with a cert chaining to a root cert in the trusted publishers store. The value is a comma-separated list of four possible values. The name is the URL of the ActiveX control you wish to allow your users to install. It consists of a name/value pair, where all the values have defaults. To really make use of this feature you need to understand the relatively obtuse configuration interface. However, in aggregate they make it seem as if you simply enable the policy with a single click. There are some articles, including one in TechNet Magazine, that mention it ( ). Unfortunately, documentation on the ActiveX Installer Service is extremely terse at the moment, and the configuration of the GPO is obscure to say the least. You can then use this list to develop a list of your own controls that you want them to install without elevation. Perhaps the best way to use the ActiveX Installer Service is to capture a set of controls that your users are trying to install on their computers. The event data includes the URL that the control came from. Open the Application Event Log and search for event ID 4097 from the ActiveX Installer Service. Navigate to a page that tries to install the control you want.Ĭlick the yellow ribbon to install the ActiveX control. If you do not know that you can get it by taking the following steps while logged on as a standard user on a computer where the ActiveX Installer Service optional feature has been installed: To configure the ActiveX Installer Service you need the exact host URL where the ActiveX control is hosted. After that you would use the Group Policy Administrative Template, under Computer Configuration:Administrative Templates:Windows Components:ActiveX Installer Service to configure which hosts users can install controls from. To use the ActiveX Installer Service an administrator first enables the service, which is included on the Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate SKUs of Windows Vista. This is quite logical if one considers that one of the primary benefits it provides is that users no longer need to be administrators to install ActiveX controls. The ActiveX Installer service is nominally a part of UAC.

In Windows XP, and particularly in SP2, some additional controls were introduced for ActiveX controls, and these controls have been expanded in Windows Vista.

Install activex control windows vista