Server Fails on Openssl Initialization - c++

Question

I am working on a win32 file server that was coded using Visual Studio 6.0. It had SSL configured and working back in 2000, but hasn't been used since.
Now, we want to use SSL (Opensll), so I've updated the libraries, etc and have the server working with SSLv3 and TLS when the server is run as a console app.
As soon as I run the server as a windows service, the ssl initialization routine crashes without any error messages. Here is the code that is causing all of the grief.
int SwiftSSL::Initialize()
{
SSLeay_add_ssl_algorithms();
SSL_load_error_strings();
ctx_ = SSL_CTX_new( SSLv23_server_method() );
if(!ctx_) {
LogEvent( "SSL_CTX is bad.");
return false;
}
LogEvent( "Before using cert and private key file.");
if ( SSL_CTX_use_certificate_file( ctx_, CERT_FILE, SSL_FILETYPE_PEM ) == 1 ) {
LogEvent( "SUCCESS SSL_CTX_use_certificate_file." );
}
else {
LogEvent( "FAILED SSL_CTX_use_certificate_file." );
return false;
}
if ( SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file( ctx_, KEY_FILE, SSL_FILETYPE_PEM ) == 0 ) {
LogEvent( "Failed SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file." );
return false;
}
else {
LogEvent( "SUCCESSFUL SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file." );
}
if ( SSL_CTX_check_private_key( ctx_ ) == 0 ) {
ERR_print_errors_fp( stderr );
LogEvent( "Failed SSL_CTX_check_private_key" );
return false;
}
LogEvent( "Successfully used cert and private key file.");
return true;
}
When run as a Windows Service, the only message logged is:
"Before using cert and private key file."
Nothing else is logged. That, to me, means that the command
SSL_CTX_use_certificate_file( ctx_, CERT_FILE, SSL_FILETYPE_PEM ) is crashing.
But why would it work with no issues when the same program is run as a console?
This is the information that I found in event viewer:
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( OPENSSL ) cannot be found. The
local computer may not have the necessary registry information or message DLL
files to display messages from a remote computer. The following information is
part of the event: OPENSSL_Uplink(00341000,08): no OPENSSL_Applink
Any help will be appreciated.

Answer 1

Ok. I woke up this morning with the solution to this situation. As it turns out, the Windows Service did not know where to find the CERT_FILE or the KEY_FILE. Apps running as a Windows Service will look for files in the %WinDir%\System32 directory. I have the files in the app directory, so I simply had to add the actual path to the files when calling SSL_CTX_use_certificate_file and SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file.
It now works fine.