Background & structure of Registry

SomeBackground


The Registry has to be one of the least understood aspects of the Windows  operating  system  family.  Even  seasoned  professionals approach it with a degree of caution, knowing that a wrong entry can  potentially  wreak  havoc  on  the  system.  To  understand  the Registry  is  to  get  to  the  heart  of  controlling  and modifying  your Windows  system.  With  a  detailed  understanding  of  what  you  are doing, you can turn your machine into a lean performance machine, customise   and   personalise   its   appearance,   and   get   fine-grained control over nearly every aspect of how Windows XP behaves.



The Structure And Working Of The Registry

HKEY_LCASSES_ROOT contains all the information related to the fundamental aspects of the windows user interface, file association mapping for drag & drop functionality, shortcuts, & OLE(Object Linking & Embedding) information.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER contains all the information related to the current user logged into the system includung such things as Desktop setting, logon names, & other user specific information.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE contains all the information regarding to the hardware, software, & other PC-specific preferences that are common to all the users who log into the machine

HKEY_USERS contains all the information related to specific preferences of individual users, who are each identified by a unique security identifier called SID. This SID is unique for life of system.

HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG contains all the information gatherd when the computer boots up, & is coppied & merged in from portions of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINES relevand to the current hardware profile. This information is not stored: it is regenrated every time the computer starts up.


Value Types
there are 3 major types: DWORD, Binary, String.

REG_DWORD is ussually used for boolean values & is a 4-byte number.UpdateMode have a setting of either 0 (disabled) or 1 (enabled).

REG_BINARYis used to store the information as raw binary data, & is usually used for hardware components.

REG_SZ is the standard string for to display human readable text.

REG_EXPAND_SZ is an expandable data string that permits storing of variables that can be replaced by actual values by the application called key.


Creating & Using .Reg files
The .reg file is actually a text file which will open in any editor like notepad. It uses specific syntax that the registry recognizes. Following the rules of syntax you can creat .reg files


RegistryEditorVersion
blank line
[RegistryPath1]
"DataItemName1"="DataType1:DataValue1"
"DataItemName2"="DataType2:DataValue2"
blank line
[RegistryPath2]
"DataItemName3"="DataType3:DataValue3"


For windows XP & Windows 2000
RegistryEditorVersion is Registry Editor Version 5.0

For Windows 98 & NT

RegistryEditorVersion is Registry Editor Version 4.0



Third Party Registry Editors

Registry commander
Download from http://www.aezay.dk

RegEditX(with Registry Crawler)
Download from www.regeditx.com

Registry Workshop
Download from www.torchsoft.com

Regstry Trackers

Registry Monitor
Download from www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/Regmon.html

MultiMon
Download from www.resplendence.com/multimon


Regstry Cleaners

CCleaner
Download from www.ccleaner.com

Easy Cleaner
Download from www.personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm

jv16 Power Tools
Download from www.jp16.org