CreateSymbolicLink runs on Windows 8 returns error code 1314 on Windows 7

Question

I am trying to create a symbolic link from a custom action dll using Wix installer.

The custom action is run as an administrator and I confirmed it by using code from:

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/windowsdesktop/CppUACSelfElevation-5bfc52dd

The problem is that on Windows 8 the symbolic link is created, however on Windows 7 error 1314 is returned:

ERROR_PRIVILEGE_NOT_HELD1314 (0x522)
A required privilege is not held by the client.

Both Windows 7 and Windows 8 users are capable of running the process as administrators.

Any idea how I can solve this issue please?

Regards,
Noel

Answer 1

The error isn't telling you you don't have access rights, it's telling you you don't have privilege . Certain privileges need to be requested explicitly under certain versions of the OS. Windows 7 seemed to to have SeCreateSymbolicLinkPrivilege off even with administrator access.

Pseudo code, but I believe you have to adjust privileges for your process token before calling CreateSymbolicLink

LUID luid;
if(LookupPrivilegeValue(NULL, _T("SeCreateSymbolicLinkPrivilege"), &luid))
{
    HANDLE hToken = get_process_token();
    TOKEN_PRIVILEGES token_privileges;
    token_privileges.PrivilegeCount             = 1;
    token_privileges.Privileges[0].Luid         = luid;
    token_privileges.Privileges[0].Attributes   = SE_PRIVILEGE_ENABLED;
    if(!AdjustTokenPrivileges(hToken, FALSE, &token_privileges, 0, NULL, NULL))
    {
        // TODO: call GetLastError and report an error.
    }
}

Answer 2

What I found out is that with an MSI installer on Windows 7 or Vista Windows will not let you create a Symbolic link even if the installer is run as an administrator. What I ended up doing is by wrapping the .msi installer into an .exe using InnoSetup and ran the symbolic link commands from the executable.

On windows 8 this works because the Installer version has changed.

Hope this helps :)