Profiling and Windows Vista security
Applies to: 
Visual Studio 
Visual Studio for Mac
Note
This article applies to Visual Studio 2017. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here
Depending on the Windows Vista User Access Permissions settings that a computer administrator has made available, an individual user might have security permission to profile a process on that computer. The following examples illustrate possible differences among users:
Some users may access advanced profiling features when the administrator has set the driver and service to start.
Domain users may access sample profiling only.
Some users may deny access to profiling to all other users.
For more information, see the ADMIN options in VSPerfCmd.
Cross-session profiling
Cross-session profiling is the ability to profile a process that runs in a different user session. For example, most services run in session 0, and users can't run directly in session 0. By using the Attach to Process button on the Performance Explorer toolbar, or the /attach option of the VSPerfCmd command-line tool, you can profile most processes in different user sessions.
You can see a list of the processes that are available by setting the cross-process profiling visibility options. These options are available in the Attach to process window that is displayed when you select Attach to Process:
Show processes from all users
When this option isn't selected, the list displays only those processes that are owned by the current user. Otherwise, the list displays processes from all users.
Show processes in all sessions
When this option isn't selected, the list displays processes in the current session. Otherwise, the list displays processes in all sessions.