Why the Registry is So Funky

[jj2007]

I agree fully with Erol, Paul, Hutch and others. The nicest comment I found is this one by Burak KALAYCI:

I love the fact that there's the Registry and it's somewhat popular, though I never use it.
Because it's one more feature I can list for my applications: "Does not use Windows registry"...

:bg

More seriously: There is no good reason to put system, app and user data all into one big crappy file. Loading and parsing a few kBytes from an ini file takes nanoseconds, allowing hundreds and thousands of installed apps to use one central file for all their garbage is inefficient and insecure. The only real excuse to use the registry is the need to export app info to a central place where it can be used by other apps. Not a very common scenario, though.

[baltoro]

DAYDREAMER,   
...Yeah,...I know what you mean,...it wasn't intended as a controversial topic. I originally posted it to the Campus, as just some more possibly useful information.
If you look at the original post,...the one really interesting blog entry is:
Why Are INI Files Deprecated in Favor of the Registry?, Nov 2007
...If you read the readers comments,...it's quite controversial,...and, it pretty much goes through all the issues that have pissed off programmers  over the years,...

I think that, as has been mentioned,...the biggest problem with the Registry is security. Windows is designed to be a networked system,...and, most users (the exception being assembly programmers, of course) don't adequately understand the Windows security model. Hell, most of them aren't even aware of the Administrative security settings (Management Console),...or, what they actually do. And, I think for the average user, the concept of securing the Registry is something they think the Operating System does automatically.