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Start a process as an another user using JNA (Windows) Tag(s): JNA/JNI


JNA (Java Native Access) provides Java programs easy access to native shared libraries (DLLs on Windows) without writing anything but Java code - no JNI or native code is required.

We use the CreateProcessWithLogin API to start a process as a different user. We need to provide the credentials (username/password and domain (if required)).

First we define the interface. 


import com.sun.jna.Native;

import com.sun.jna.Pointer;

import com.sun.jna.WString;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.Advapi32;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.WinBase.PROCESS_INFORMATION;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.WinBase.STARTUPINFO;



// https://github.com/twall/jna#readme

// you need 2 jars : jna-3.5.1.jar and platform-3.5.1.jar



public interface MoreAdvApi32 extends Advapi32 {

  MoreAdvApi32 INSTANCE =

        (MoreAdvApi32) Native.loadLibrary("AdvApi32", MoreAdvApi32.class);



  /*

   * BOOL WINAPI CreateProcessWithLogonW( __in LPCWSTR lpUsername,

   * __in_opt LPCWSTR lpDomain, __in LPCWSTR lpPassword, __in DWORD

   * dwLogonFlags, __in_opt LPCWSTR lpApplicationName, __inout_opt LPWSTR

   * lpCommandLine, __in DWORD dwCreationFlags, __in_opt LPVOID

   * lpEnvironment, __in_opt LPCWSTR lpCurrentDirectory, __in

   * LPSTARTUPINFOW lpStartupInfo, __out LPPROCESS_INFORMATION

   * lpProcessInfo );

  */



  // http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms682431%28v=vs.85%29.aspx

  boolean CreateProcessWithLogonW

            (WString lpUsername,

             WString lpDomain,

             WString lpPassword,

             int dwLogonFlags,

             WString lpApplicationName,

             WString lpCommandLine,

             int dwCreationFlags,

             Pointer lpEnvironment,

             WString lpCurrentDirectory,

             STARTUPINFO  lpStartupInfo,

             PROCESS_INFORMATION lpProcessInfo);



  public static final int LOGON_WITH_PROFILE          = 0x00000001;

  public static final int LOGON_NETCREDENTIALS_ONLY   = 0x00000002;





  int CREATE_NO_WINDOW            = 0x08000000;

  int CREATE_UNICODE_ENVIRONMENT  = 0x00000400;

  int CREATE_NEW_CONSOLE          = 0x00000010;

  int DETACHED_PROCESS            = 0x00000008;

}
To use it : 

import com.sun.jna.WString;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.Kernel32;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.Kernel32Util;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.WinBase.PROCESS_INFORMATION;

import com.sun.jna.platform.win32.WinBase.STARTUPINFO;



public class CreateProcessAsUser {

  public static void  main(String ... args ) {

    WString nullW = null;

    PROCESS_INFORMATION processInformation = new PROCESS_INFORMATION();

    STARTUPINFO startupInfo = new STARTUPINFO();

    boolean result = MoreAdvApi32.INSTANCE.CreateProcessWithLogonW

       (new WString("username"),                         // user

        nullW,                                           // domain , null if local

        new WString("password"),                         // password

        MoreAdvApi32.LOGON_WITH_PROFILE,                 // dwLogonFlags

        nullW,                                           // lpApplicationName

        new WString("c:\\windows\\system32\\cmd.exe"),   // command line

        MoreAdvApi32.CREATE_NEW_CONSOLE,                 // dwCreationFlags

        null,                                            // lpEnvironment

        new WString("C:\\temp\\test"),                   // directory

        startupInfo,

        processInformation);



        if (!result) {

          int error = Kernel32.INSTANCE.GetLastError();

          System.out.println("OS error #" + error);

          System.out.println(Kernel32Util.formatMessageFromLastErrorCode(error));

        }

    }

}