The following sections describe attributes, child elements, and parent elements.

Attributes

Enabled Attribute

Child Elements

None.

Parent Elements

In the .NET Framework versions 1.0 and 1.1, the WindowsIdentity does not flow across any user-defined asynchronous points. In the .NET Framework version 2.0, there is an ExecutionContext object that contains information about the currently executing thread, and flows it across asynchronous points within an application domain. The WindowsIdentity also flows as part of the information that flows across the asynchronous points, which means that if an impersonation context exits it will flow as well. This element is used to specify that the WindowsIdentity does not flow across asynchronous points.

Note:

The common language runtime (CLR) is aware of impersonation operations performed using only managed code, not of impersonation performed outside of managed code, such as through platform invoke to unmanaged code or through direct calls to Win32 functions. Only managed WindowsIdentity objects can flow across asynchronous points, unless the alwaysFlowImpersonationPolicy element has been set to true (<alwaysFlowImpersonationPolicy enabled="true"/>). Setting the alwaysFlowImpersonationPolicy element to true specifies that the Windows identity always flows across asynchronous points, regardless of how impersonation was performed. For more information on flowing unmanaged impersonation across asynchronous points, see <alwaysFlowImpersonationPolicy> Element.

This element can be used only in the application configuration file.

You can alter this default behavior in two other ways:

1. In managed code on a per-thread basis.

   You can suppress the flow on a per-thread basis by modifying the ExecutionContext and SecurityContext settings by using the ExecutionContext..::.SuppressFlow, SecurityContext..::.SuppressFlowWindowsIdentity or SecurityContext..::.SuppressFlow method.

2. In the call to the unmanaged hosting interface to load the common language runtime (CLR).

   If an unmanaged hosting interface (instead of a simple managed executable) is used to load the CLR, you can specify a special flag in the call to the CorBindToRuntimeEx Function function. To enable the compatibility mode for the entire process, set the flags parameter for CorBindToRuntimeEx Function to STARTUP_LEGACY_IMPERSONATION.

The following example shows how to specify the legacy behavior that does not flow the Windows identity across asynchronous points.

<configuration>
   <runtime>
      <legacyImpersonationPolicy enabled="true"/>
   </runtime>
</configuration>

Reference

Other Resources