Windows Registry is the database used to store configurations, settings and options for Microsoft Windows systems. The database has a hierarchical structure.
The Windows Registry provides information about the settings for low-level operating system and applications running on the platforms. The kernel, user interface, device drivers, services, SAM and third party applications are some platforms which use the Window Registry.
To boost computers performance, the registry also gives a method to use counters.
At the time registry was first coupled with Windows 3.1, its main aim was to store information on configuration of components based on COM.
The use of registry was inflated with the launch of Windows 95 and Windows NT so as to organize the surplus of INI files per program, which had been used earlier to amass settings of configuration for Windows programs.
Keys and values are the two basic components of the Registry database.
Inside keys, Registry Values are stored and they actually represent name/data pairs.
Manipulation of registry values is carried out by the API functions of Windows, which access names of values discretely from their key paths and/or from Windows handle that acknowledges the parent key.
Although, the term is a little bit confusing, with values resembling associative arrays, wherein standard definition suggests that a key is the name portion of value.
In Windows 3, keys were devoid of containing arbitrary names/data pairs, instead they contained only one unnamed value that needs to be a string.
Theres provision for manually editing registry in MS Windows by carrying out the execution of regedt32.exe and regedit.exe in Windows directories.
However, sloppy registry editing can lead to a slow computer or losses that cant be reversed. So, performing registry backups must be the priority, and the same has been advised by the software giant Microsoft and various other professionals, authors and editors of business magazines.
Windows 3.x, also known as the “Registration Info Editor” or “Registration Editor”, demonstrated the implementation of current Registry tools.
Typically, it was merely a database of applications that are used to edit OLE objects embedded in documents.
Here is the test of alertness as there are a lot of distinctions between the two editors available on these operating systems.
Microsoft Windows XP was the first system in which both the programs were integrated into one. This integrated program contained the interface of REGEDIT.EXE and the functionality of REGEDT32.EXE.
With REGEDIT.EXE being the enhanced editor and the other one, i.e. REGEDT32.EXE, invoking the former one, there doesnt seem any difference on the newer operating systems including Windows XP.
The Registry Editor permits users to carry out functions that follow:
- Loading, manipulating and unloading registry hive format files (Windows NT-based systems only)
- Setting permissions based on ACLs (Windows NT-based systems only)
- Bookmarking user-selected registry keys as Favorites
- Finding particular strings in key names, value names and value data
- Remotely editing the registry on another networked computer
Apart from Microsoft, Registry could also be edited in LINUX with the help of open source Offline NT Password & Registry Editor for files’ editing.