Installing an Adobe AIR app from an unprivileged account

So, Brian Love created this cool Adobe AIR application called "CF Docs on AIR."  It's an AIR app to interface with CFQuickDocs.  I thought it looked interesting, so I went to install it on my machine. That's where the problem comes in.  I download and install the AIR update that is out there, everything's fine.  I go to install CF Docs on AIR, things start out just fine.  It warns me about the unknown app, makes me agree to the license, progress bar starts flying, gets to the end, victory is near, then bam...error.

The error window proclaims: "The application could not be installed. Try installing it again. If the problem persists, contact the application author. Error# 0"

Error 0?  That's descriptive!  So I dig a little.  It appears that you can create an application install log using these directions from Adobe. 

So, I create the logfile and start snooping around. I won't post the whole file as there is quite a bit of irrelevant (for this discussion) information in there.  The key lines to note are:

Installing C:\Documents and Settings\sal21\Local Settings\Temp\fla359.tmp\setup.msi
Error occurred; beginning rollback: [ErrorEvent type="error" bubbles=false
   cancelable=false eventPhase=2 text="1603" errorID=0]

What this is basically saying is that the Windows Installer is sending an error back to the AIR Application installer.  The text of the error is 1603.  This windows error can be several things, but for this particular instance it is that the installer isn't running under the right credentials.  It needs administrative rights.

So now what?  Well, I did have an administrative account to my machine, so I could just log off and log back on as an administrator, install the app, then log off and log back into my normal account.  That's quite the pain.  I have several things open, I'm logged into a few services, etc.  But there is an alternative.  I can use "Run As" and run the AIR Application Installer under a privileged account. 

Since that isn't the most straight-forward thing for AIR, I've chronicled the steps below.

1. Download the CF Docs on AIR (or whatever AIR app you choose) to your local machine.  I placed mine on my desktop.
2. Create a shortcut to the Adobe AIR application installer if you don't already have one.  I didn't have one, so I created one in my Start Menu (for future installs.)  To save you the hassle I had of finding it, the AIR Application Installer is in C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe AIR\Versions\1.0\  I would assume the version numbers will change as AIR versions increase.  The name of the executable is Adobe AIR Application Installer.exe.
3. Right-click on the shortcut and choose "Run As...". 
   
4. When the Run As dialog pops up, enter the credentials of an account on your machine with administrative rights and click "OK."
5. The "Select an Application" window should come up.  Choose the .AIR install file that you downloaded and click "OPEN"
   

Voila! There you have it.  The application should install and run as expected. 

This should not be a problem for all AIR apps, but I have not tried too many since setting up my machine to run as a normal unprivileged user. 

I didn't find a whole lot of documentation when I looked around for my solution, so I hope this helps someone else out.