Installing server on Vista

[Flagship]

There are a few gotcha's when running the Public version of the ventrilo server on Windows Vista.

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#1: After running the server installer you can't edit the default INI file.

The problem is that the Vista version of the Windows Installer does not assign your system account name to have write/modify access rights to the files or the installation directory. Instead it assigns two generic groups access rights of which only the "Administrators" group has full control and the "Users" group has read only rights.

Note: Just because you gave your system login account system admin rights doesn't mean you have real system admin rights. For lack of a better description Vista has levels of "system admin" and you don't have the God mode level rights like you did with XP/2000/NT when you gave your login account system admin. (Overly simplistic answer).

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#2: The Windows Installer doesn't assign your login account the write/modify rights for the directory that the files are installed into. This also means that the server can't even create the needed log file when it's run from your account as is.

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#3: Your system login account also will not have sufficient rights to install the service program. You will get an error saying "Unable to open the Service Manager" if you try doing the service install process.

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File modification access rights solution:

1) Open your "Computer" icon.
2) Double click the C: drive (or where ever you installed the program)
3) Double click "Program files"
4) Right click on "VentSrv"
5) Click the "Security" tab.
6) Click the "Edit" button
7) Click the "Add" button
8) Click the "Advanced" button
9) Click the "Find Now" button
10) Select your system login name.
11) Click OK
12) Click OK when you return to the "Select users or group" window.
13) Make sure your account name is selected in the "Group of user names" list.
14) Check the "Full control" option under the "Allow" column.
15) Click OK
16) Click OK in the "VentSrv Properties" window.

This will allow your system login account to modify the INI file or any other files created in the same directory, which will happen as you run the program.

I'll be reviewing the Windows Installer scripts for the next major upgrade to see if this can be avoided.

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Service installation solution:

1) Instead of logging in with your regular system account, login with the administrator account.
2) Select the Start button -> VentSrv -> Service -> Install.