Windows User Account and Realmworks
 

Hi there,

I´ve installed a GM Version of Realmworks on my player PC. Now I try to install player version and it tells me I can only have one account per windows user account. I don´t like that at all because it makes things complicated. I uninstalled RW and made a fresh install only to be presented with my GM account again. So no clean deinstallation. I know there are ways to fix that but it´s not user friendly. What is the fastest way to clean that out?

Greetings,

Troedel

Update: Despite RW saying it will delete the user files in the hidden /user/app folder it does not. Manually deleting the files and reinstalling I was able to create a new account. Despite this I would like to see more than one account per windows user account. Hope it helps someone.

If you have the GM version, that works as the player version if you connect to someone else's realm. you wouldn't have the two installed side-by-side.

100% Correct. You should only ever need ONE copy of Realm Works installed on a computer for a single Realm Works account. That one copy will then behave as both GM or Player, depending on the realm.

The only reason you would want two separate instances of Realm Works on a single computer is if two separate users are intending to access distinct Realm Works accounts on that same computer. For example, a computer shared within a household by a family or roommates could support multiple separate Realm Works accounts for different members of the household. In that case, each Realm Works user would need to have a separate Windows User Account, which would typically be the case anyways with a shared computer.

Rob - I must disagree that it is the typical way. It might be common, but I can speak for experience that many people share computers and dont have multiple logins. I know many families that share one computer that dont use multiple windows logins. I never argued about it, because I dont think its that big a deal, and it might be something you are stuck with, but I think it would be nice if that limitation wasn't in place.

I have to chime in with mirtos. I've been fixing/building/upgrading people's home computers off and on for years and I almost never see shared machines using multiple Windows user accounts. I don't even use them on the computers in our gaming basement: there's a single shared account for public use with software and access to local network resources (printing!) already set up.

I know my experiences are anecdotal and I'm not sure how much this restriction will affect sales in the long run, but there are plenty of shared computers with a single account out there.

Changing it at this point will entail a meaningful amount of work. That means changing it needs to be handled as a feature request, just like all the other requests we've received, as it will be competing for the same development resources. Users who find our approach limiting for their use of the product can lobby for it to be changed by creating a Feature Request thread and up-voting it there. Until the change gets enough demand behind it to outweigh other features, using separate Windows user accounts will work in the interim.

That maybe the case, but they are doing it wrong.

I have to agree with Rob here, they had to make a choice, and they follow proper standards, if multiple people use a computer they should each have their own account.

I also am glad they did it they way they did, one install for both player and GM, as a player and GM both, this makes my life and those in my group that use RW much easier.

To me it's weird that an application that asks you to log in each time you start it up presents it like a standard login dialog but doesn't actually let you change the user that's logging in. (If you're no longer sure that the displayed username is yours then the only option they give you is to contact tech support!)

Letting you easily change the login user likely also requires putting each RW account's data in a separate account directory inside the directory storing the application's data. (The other option is to throw away the current downloaded DB, which generates all sorts of "what if there's changes" questions.)

As much as software developers (like myself!) might like to change it, correctness in use of computers means very little. If a significant fraction of your potential users do something you need to consider that when making decisions, even if technically they're "doing it wrong". Sometimes the right decision is to support what they do, sometimes the right decision is to push them to do what you want. (Supporting Windows XP is a biggie in this arena right now.)

The real question, though, is how much does an issue actually affect your customers? I'm guessing very few will be hit by issues related to using a single user account, but I also think it's right to bring up what we've seen in the real world to make sure it hasn't been overlooked.

If RW is sandboxed to a single login account and we cannot change the user for login, can we please have the option to get rid of the password and have RW autologin? If I don't trust others with my account, I need to stop them from logging into my computer....

That's something that's been on the todo list for a VERY long while. Some people will want it and some won't, so it needs to be configurable as a preference. And we need to save the password locally in a secure manner. So it's not hard, but it does require a non-trivial amount of work, and it's something we haven't gotten to yet. :)