Windows Registry hives

The Windows Registry is an essential component of the Microsoft Windows operating system. It stores configuration information for the operating system, hardware devices, and installed applications. The registry is organized into subtrees, which are similar to directories in a filesystem. These subtrees contain keys and values, which hold the configuration data.

The registry is divided into five subtrees: HKCR, HKCU, HKLM, HKU, and HKCC. Each subtree contains keys and values that hold configuration data related to different aspects of the operating system, software, and hardware, as follows:

• HKCR contains information about registered file types, Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) controls, and Component Object Model (COM) objects. This subtree is used by Windows to determine how to open files based on their file type.
• HKCU contains configuration data for the current user. This subtree stores user-specific settings such as desktop settings, application...