I have a Windows service written in CPP that I start manually. The service starts up just fine and works ok. However we have recently noticed in the Windows Services GUI that the service shows in the Starting state. Upon examining the Event Viewer it clearly shows that the service has entered the Running state.
Anyone got any nuggets of gold on this one?
Thanks.
The problem turned out to be an unaccounted for call to the SCM to start the service. Deleted the line and the problem went away.
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We have automatically started service which in some cases spends a lot of the time loading necessary data, let's say 10 minutes. During this time it works as expected (processing some huge data files required to start). I report the progess by C++ SetServiceStatus function, it is working fine.
This service is not dependent on anything and has only one dependency which is again our own service. It is started after those 10 minutes, it needs the first "server" service to be fully running to accept the requests.
I thought that windows would start all other automatic services (in less then 10 minutes as usually) and then start working normally but system is completely blocked during startup (i can't login to computer or ping the computer) until this one specific service is started (reports SERVICE_RUNNING by SetServiceStatus). When out service completely starts, the other missing system services (required for network, remote desktop, whatever, it's quite random) are also started. Is this normal behaviour? Why are non-depending processes (as remote desktop, network connections, etc.) waiting for this process? Am I missing something?
I tried to add some dependencies to postpone the startup of my service but I ended up with many dependencies and behaviour still somehow random (as order of services is random). Sometimes I was able to login but for example Start button started working only after those 10 minutes when my service was started. I am not sure what is "the last service" to depend on and what services to include to my depend-list and on some computers this services can be disabled and it can bring new problems... so I don't like this solution very much.
Another option was Delayed start option for our service. This should start service when all other automatic services are running. Well, this works fine, windows boots, computer running and responding, our service is started, but the performance is very bad, many times slower than usually, it seems that delayed started services have much lower priority or something like that.
My only current solution is to report to system that my service is running (by SetServiceStatus function), but to continue loading (this works, I tested it). But then we have problem with our dependent service as it needs to be started when the first one is really ready. It can be solved but I still wonder how is this possible and if there is something I could use to keep the current state of automatic started service which reports "started" when it is really fully started and prepared to work. Thanks for any ideas.
Set SERVICE_RUNNING as soon as possible, and then continue processing in background. Make your other service resilient to the first service being in a running state, but not yet ready to service.
The longer the service is in the starting state the more problems we get from different windows versions.
I have an issue with a windows service that I am writing in c++ on Windows 7. The service works fine, when I "install" it and is removed when I "uninstall" (from services.msc list), but I am having 2 issues which I was hoping I could get some help with
If I stop the service (via services.msc), the service disappears from services.msc list.
If I stop the service via my program, the startup type of the service changes to disabled and hence does not have the "Start/Stop/Restart" buttons.
The service is stopped successfully.
I was hoping for a pointer in the right direction, I am using MSDN as the guide to writing the service. The service when started works fine.
Thank You
I have a service which constantly checks some application and assures that it wasn't closed. If this app closed - service launches it again.
The problem starts when user decides to log off the session. During logoff all applications are closing including the mine one. But the service is still running and constantly trying to start it again.
The questions is how to notify the service that user is going to log off and the application doesn't need to be restarted anymore? I've tried to make it using SERVICE_CONTROL_SESSIONCHANGE notification. But in accordance to MSDN they come to services when all apps already closed and logging off procedure completed. It is too late for me. Is there any way to programmatically find out that current session is in process of logging off?
My service launched under LocalSystem account.
Thanks.
p.s. I don't have the access to application source code. The goal need to be achieved without modifying it.
Have your service run two applications: the one it is a watchdog for, and a second one which you implement yourself. This second one can then respond to the log-off event by sending a message to the service (a la David Heffernan's answer), and the service will then know not to restart the watched job.
Open a communication channel between your app and your service and arrange for the app to tell the service that it is closing because of a logoff event.
You may not have access to the source code of the executable, but that doesn't mean that you can't affect the process. For instance, you could inject a DLL. Using SetWindowsHookEx, you'd catch the WM_ENDSESSION sent to the apps main window.
Why don't you create your service under the user that is running the App and tell it to startup automatic? In this case you should get the SERVICE_CONTROL_SHUTDOWN message when your user is logging off since the service would also be terminated.
I wrote a C++ service that functions perfectly under Windows XP but fails to start in Windows 7. SC CREATE returns success, however, SC START returns FAILED 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion. From what I understand this is caused by timeout, but I receive the error immediately.
Is this a problem with my service code or some setting in 7?
Does Windows 7 send service control requests differently then XP?
If so, how would I go about catching the start request?
Please let me know if you need to see the code as well as any other information that will help solve this problem.
Thanks
Solved Problem by installing MSVCR100D.dll into system32. No need to even change my code.
I have a service application that on startup and shutdown logs an event log record.
I rebuild the application frequently and also then the executable on the host machine. And here is the problem, after my service shutdown the Windows Eventlog service (not the event log viewer) is holding an open handle to the executable so I cant update it.
I have the event log messages embedded in the executable, i could move it out but then I just move the update problem to another file.
I've double checked and I have paired ::RegisterEventSource/::DeregisterEventSource correctly.
Anyone encountered this problem ?
I've also run into this issue, so just adding some of my experiences.
I have a Windows 2008 Service system (have not seen this on 2003 Server), and when I stop my service, and instance of svchost.exe loads the service executable (visible using vmmap.exe or Process Hacker) preventing it from being deleted/overwritten during uninstall/install. The instance of svchost.exe is running the DHCP Client (Dhcp), TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper (lmhosts), and Windows Event Log (EventLog) services.
In our case, we have created a registry entry to make our service executable an event source. (though I'm unsure exactly why we are doing this, or whether we should be doing this).
Empirically, if I remove that registry entry before stopping the service, the executable is not loaded by svchost.exe and all is fine. If the service has already been stopped and executable loaded by svchost.exe, restarting the Event Log service (or killing the process) also frees up the executable.
I'm guessing our service is not well-behaved (perhaps a side effect of being a 32-bit process on 64-bit OS?) or correctly installed, but haven't isolated the issue yet.
Update: It appears this issue is only happening on HP systems (and not Dell or IBM) which is curious. There are HP-specific management components installed, so perhaps one of them is altering the behavior somehow?
I've also run into this issue. In my case, nxlog service reading logs. Simply stop nxlog service before replace event source file.
I think it is probably the event log viewer. Close the viewer and you'll be fine.