I've been using the Exception Management Application Block for quite some time now, and for general purpose it's great. Especially when I need some detailed information about exceptions generated from an asp.net application, EMAB's got my back.

The only problem that I've had so far (barring non-perfectly formed configSections) I ran into today, and it had to do with Registry Access. I'm in the midst of deploying a windows forms application that uses the EMAB, but the user I wanted to deploy to was not an administrator (and really shouldn't be.) So, I had to :

• rebuild my installer, removing the custom action to install EMAB
• log the user out
• log in as administrator
• run cmd: cd C:\%windir%\microsoft.net\framework\v1.1.4322\
• installutil "Path to EMAB"
• let the user log back in before we could test things.

What a pain in the ass! Maybe I'm just spoiled from all of this xcopy deployment bru-haha.;) Anyways, I hope that .NET becomes easier for non-administrators to use...okay, maybe that's a gross generalization, but the point is that Registry Access never crossed my mind as an issue to resolve, because I'm always running in "God Mode" and therefore never really worry about these things.

Funny thing is that I created a fake User in the same group as the target user and deployed the application to a test machine before I ever put the app on the target machine - the installer and everything worked like a charm, but shouldn't have (unless EMAB was already installed:)...Okay, I need to blog more b/c this is turning into a rant. All I really wanted to do was outline what I needed to do to get EMAB installed for a non-administrator. Shh! If you're still reading, don't tell, aiight?