Creating windows service in c

Describes the process of creating and configuring Windows services using the Windows service project template. ServiceBase - Describes the major features of the ServiceBase class, which is used to create services.

ServiceProcessInstaller - Describes the features of the ServiceProcessInstaller class, which is used along with the ServiceInstaller class to install and uninstall your services. ServiceInstaller - Describes the features of the ServiceInstaller class, which is used along with the ServiceProcessInstaller class to install and uninstall your service. Create Projects from Templates - Describes the projects types used in this chapter and how to choose between them.

Skip to main content. This browser is no longer supported. Windows services can also be started automatically or manually. You can also manually pause, stop and restart Windows services. Windows service is a computer program that runs in the background to execute some tasks. Some examples of Windows services are auto-update of Windows, check emails, print documents, SQL Server agent, file and folder scanning and indexing and so on.

If you open your Task Manager and click on the Services tab, you will see hundreds of services running on your machine. You can also see the statuses of these services. Some services are running, some have paused, and some have stopped. You can start, stop, and pause a service from here by right click on the service.

How to create a Windows service in C? Very important: Don't ever try to call any method before the call of InitializeComponent method. LocalSystem; You also can add description and display service name optionally. Demo" ; Step 8 In this step, we will implement a timer, and code to call the service at a given time.

We will create a text file and write the current time in the text file using the service. David Heffernan David Heffernan k 40 40 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. MS seems to have removed this in VS and later versions. Sign up or log in Sign up using Google. Sign up using Facebook. Sign up using Email and Password. Post as a guest Name. Email Required, but never shown.

The Overflow Blog. Rename the file to MyNewService. A pop-up window appears asking whether you would like to rename all references to the code element Service1. In the Design tab, select Properties from the shortcut menu. In this section, you add a custom event log to the Windows service. The EventLog component is an example of the type of component you can add to a Windows service.

Define a custom event log. Add a using statement to MyNewService. Diagnostics namespace:. In the code editor for MyNewService. Add code that writes an entry to the event log when the service starts:.

Because a service application is designed to be long-running, it usually polls or monitors the system, which you set up in the OnStart method. The OnStart method must return to the operating system after the service's operation has begun so that the system isn't blocked. To set up a simple polling mechanism, use the System. Timer component. The timer raises an Elapsed event at regular intervals, at which time your service can do its monitoring.

You use the Timer component as follows:. Add the following code in the MyNewService. OnStart event to set up the polling mechanism:. Timers namespace:. Elapsed event:.

In the MyNewService class, add a member variable. It contains the identifier of the next event to write into the event log:.

Instead of running all your work on the main thread, you can run tasks by using background worker threads. For more information, see System. Insert a line of code in the OnStop method that adds an entry to the event log when the service is stopped:. You can override the OnPause , OnContinue , and OnShutdown methods to define additional processing for your component.

Services report their status to the Service Control Manager so that a user can tell whether a service is functioning correctly. InteropServices namespace:. Add the following code to MyNewService. Before you run a Windows service, you need to install it, which registers it with the Service Control Manager.