Arguably Vista's most notorious feature is User Account Control, which has its heart in the right place (i.e., it tries to stonewall malware) but annoys the bejeezus out of most users--who usually end up disabling it altogether.

The solution is a smarter UAC, one that's just as effective at preventing unwanted installations and system changes but less intrusive to the user. Windows 7 promises such a solution, but it's a long, long way off.

In the meantime, there's Smart UAC, a free utility that lets you tag specific programs as safe, thereby keeping them from bothering you in the future. Here's a summary from Windows-administrator blog 4sysops:

Smart UAC's dialog window offers two additional options: "Always allow every action of this program" and "Always deny every action of this program." Smart UAC also has an allow list and a deny list which can be edited manually. Note that you have to always click on "Cancel" if you don't want the program to start, even though you want to add it to the deny list.

As an added bonus, Smart UAC features a built-in malware scanner.