Dameware, error 2 work-around

At work, we continue to lock-down our systems to the point of detriment for the techs. Tools we’re supposed to rely on, often won’t work because of some security change that wasn’t tested thoroughly enough. I’ve been running in to “Error 2: the system could not find the file specified”. Here’s the fix for that:

Copy this list of files below from your Dameware installation folder, or copy the folder from a working client machine from C:\Windows\DWRCS – that’s literally it.

  • cpprest110_xp_1_2.dll
  • Dameware.LogAdjuster.exe.config
  • Dameware.Diagnostics
  • Dameware.LogAdjuster.exe
  • DWRCChat.dll
  • DWRCK.dll
  • DWRCRSS.dll
  • DWRCS.EXE
  • DWRCS.Logging.xml
  • DWRCSE.dll
  • DWRCSET.dll
  • DWRCSh.dll
  • DWRCST.EXE
  • DWRCST.Logging.xml
  • DWSGRWRP.dll
  • ICSharpCode.SharpZipLib.dll
  • log4cxx.dll
  • log4net.dll
  • LogConfigurations.xml
  • SolarWinds.Logging.dll
  • SolarWinds.Orion.Common.dll
  • SolarwindsDiagnostics.exe
  • SolarwindsDiagnostics.exe.config

If you need the 64-bit versions, the same file names are appended by .x64, just rename those to the .dll or .sig or .extension it’s filename w/o the .x64 has and place in the same directory.

Ignoring UAC

set __compat_layer=RunAsInvoker

That simple environmental variable will allow you to ignore the UAC prompt and still execute the program (or at least try to). You still won’t have administrator privileges but sometimes, in a corporate environment, you run into a program that’s being blocked due to (poor) blanket security configuration.