Some files (e.g. \windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts) need to be edited using "run as administrator" with UAC turned on - fair enough. However, it appears that they cannot accept dropped files in this state (yet curiously file paths can be copied and pasted into the open dialogue). I fail to see how this "protects" me from anything - the exact same actions are being performed with the exact same data, it's just that more steps need to be gone through to perform them. Is there a way for e.g. notepad (or another editor) to only ask for elevated priveleges at the time that it writes, rather than reads data? That would both eliminate the extra work required and the arguable "security hole" that exists now.

There is no way to a such thing other than proceeding like that: 1-Right click on Notepad 2-Click on run as an administrator

This is an article about the advantages of using the run as an administrator option: http://netsecurity.about.com/od/quicktips/qt/qt_run_as.htm

this is how the UAC works. Drag- and Drop are messages. And sending messages from a program with normal rights, to an application with admin rights can cause security issue. Do Drag & Drop only work with application with the same rights (program with Admin rights to program with admin rights or program with normal rights to program with normal rights )."A programmer is just a tool which converts caffeine into code" CLIP- Stellvertreter http://www.winvistaside.de/