The hierarchical database - Registry - for Windows stores settings and options for configuration on MS Windows operating systems.

The registry contains set-up for components of low-level operating systems and the applications based on that platform. Registry is used by device drivers, the kernels, SAM, user interface, services and all the third party software.

The Windows Registry also enables to access counter which helps in analyzing the performance of system.

The primary function of the Windows registry, when it was initially launched with Windows 3.1, was to accumulate configuration details regarding COM-based components.

The use of registry was inflated with the launch of Windows 95 and Windows NT so as to organize the surplus of INI files per program, which had been used earlier to amass settings of configuration for Windows programs.

The Windows registry includes two basic elements values and keys.

Inside keys, Registry Values are stored and they actually represent name/data pairs.

The Windows API functions, which query and maneuver registry values, obtain the names of values distinctly from the key path and/or from the handle that recognizes the parent key.

The terminology seems to be misleading because the values resemble to an associative array. This associative array uses standard terminology for referring the name part of the value as a key.

The terminologies are a proffer from the 16-bit registry of Windows 3, wherein keys did not possess arbitrary pairs of name/data, but instead had just a single unnamed value that essentially needed to be a string.

Theres provision for manually editing registry in MS Windows by carrying out the execution of regedt32.exe and regedit.exe in Windows directories.

However, sloppy registry editing can lead to a slow Windows 7 or losses that cant be reversed. So, performing registry backups must be the priority, and the same has been advised by the software giant Microsoft and various other professionals, authors and editors of business magazines.

A direct implementation of the current registry tool was seen in Windows 3.x, known as the “Registration Editor” or “Registration Info Editor”.

This was a database of applications primarily used to edit inserted OLE objects in documents.

But the users need to be cautious as the two editors on the aforementioned platforms differ tremendously.

An integrated program of these two distinct programs was firstly seen in Windows XP. The operating system embraced the REGEDIT.EXE interface and infused the REGEDT32.EXE functionality into it.

However, the distinctions do not occur with Windows XP as well as the newer versions REGEDIT.EXE being the improved editor and REGEDT32.EXE being purely a stub invoking REGEDIT.EXE.

The Registry Editor permits users to carry out functions that follow:

• Importing and exporting .REG files, exporting data in the binary hive format
• Creating, manipulating, renaming and deleting registry keys, subkeys, values and value data
• Finding particular strings in key names, value names and value data
• Bookmarking user-selected registry keys as Favorites

Apart from Microsoft, Registry could also be edited in LINUX with the help of open source Offline NT Password & Registry Editor for files’ editing.