Most Windows programs use the Windows Registry to store configuration data.  Did you know that starting with Windows Vista, your application can no longer write to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE Registry key in the same way as all previous Windows versions?  Now entries are "virtualized" into each user's own private copy, instead of one single entry for all users, thus making it the same as HKEY_CURRENT_USER.  This is a huge issue, as it will break many hundreds of thousands of existing programs that write data under this key.  For this reason we have created the RegDb COM DLL as an alternative to the Windows Registry so programs can have their own configuration database and no longer be dependent on these kinds of major changes that Microsoft makes.  Consider these important features:

• Similar function to the Windows Registry: Has HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE for all users, and HKEY_CURRENT_USER for the current user.

• Supports storing the same data types: String, DWORD, Binary and also adds Float.

• COM interface, so you can use it from almost any language.

• Includes freely distributable viewer/editor program, very similar to RegEdit (see screenshot below).

• Uses industry standard SQLite relational database file as the storage file, so there is no worry about a proprietary file format.  You can view and edit your data using any of the many SQLite database tools on the market, such as our SqlitePlus Database Explorer if you wanted to.

• Automatically sets the file permission to allow the "All Users" group to have full access to the RegDb file.

• Features encryption option, so you can easily encrypt your values with no special programming needed.

• Easy to serialize .NET classes and data

• Works with all Windows versions Win95-Vista!

*** If you need the Viewer-Editor to be localized to your locale, we can send you the .rc file for you to translate - its not large and so can be done in less than an hour.   We will make localized builds in your language from then on ***

Almost all programs require some sort of configuration storage.  With the advent of .NET we seem to have come full circle in regard to application settings.  Back in the pre-Win95 days Microsoft invented INI files, and told us they were good.  And so they were.  Then along came 95 and NT, and Microsoft said no, the registry is the way to go, forget INI files.  And so we did.  Now in .NET we're told to use CONFIG files, which is basically the same concept as an INI file, albeit being XML it’s an INI file on steroids.  Now nost programs use the Windows Registry, but some use INI files, and others use XML files.  Each have their drawbacks.  For example, you should not store large data values in the Windows Registry, and you cannot easily store binary data in text INI and XML files.  And starting with Windows Vista, you cannot store common data to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE key (it will make a 'virtual' copy that is for the current user only).  RegDb has none of these limitations.  Since it uses the SQLite database file as the underlying file storage, it can hold any data type of almost any size - and its lightning fast and efficient.

Automatically Grants "All User" Permissions

If your program only needs a .ini file you might be thinking, "no problem, I'll just create a .ini file in the 'All Users/Application Data' folder".  Unfortunately this won't work in all situations.  This is because if the file is created by an Admin user, all other non-Admin users will not have "write permission" on the file, and so cannot set any configuration data in the file.  RegDb overcomes this by automatically changing the file permissions when it is first created, to grant all users full access to the file.

Usage Scenarios

Suppose you need to store configuration data that must be updated and accessed by all users of the machine.  Your application previously used the Windows Registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE key to store this data.  Now you will use RegDb instead.  You can place your RegDb file(s) into the Windows "All Users/Application Data" folder, so that the file will be accessible to all users of the machine.  The RegDb COM DLL has a method named GetCommonAppDataFolder which returns the path to this folder, so you can use it to easily build a path to your shared RegDb file.

Here is a Visual Basic sample that demonstrates opening a shared RegDb file and adding some configuration data to it.

Very simple, isn't it?  We set the license, open the file, open a Key and set a value.  Now let's see how to retrieve the value we just set.

If anything, I think you would agree this is even easier than using the Reg* Windows API.  You can also store values under HKEY_CURRENT_USER by specifying eRegKeyCurrentUser in the OpenKey method.

Freely distributable RegDb File Editor/Viewer

Of course, you also need to be able to view (and possible hand-edit) your RegDb files, so we have included a free utility, very similar to RegEdit.exe.  Here is a screenshot: