

It is not a requirement for Windows applications to use the Windows Registry. NET Framework applications use XML files for configuration, while portable applications usually keep their configuration files with their executables. #Myscript notes 2.2 registration key portable INI files stored each program's settings as a text file or binary file, often located in a shared location that did not provide user-specific settings in a multi-user scenario. By contrast, the Windows Registry stores all application settings in one logical repository (but a number of discrete files) and in a standardized form. According to Microsoft, this offers several advantages over. Since file parsing is done much more efficiently with a binary format, it may be read from or written to more quickly than a text INI file.

