Service account becomes inactive in windows 2008 application server - windows-server-2008

I have a service account in windows 2008 application server to achieve word to pdf conversion. 3-4 days back everything was working fine and all of a sudden the functionality shut down.
I dig into details. The information I got is as below:
When I log in with that service account and try to achieve that functionality, I'm able to do it.
When I log off with service account and try to achieve that functionality, I'm not able to do it.
Conclusion: Somehow the service account gets inactive.
The problem is very weird and i tried each and every combination of permission in Dcom config. Any help in right direction is highly appreciated. Thank a ton in advance.

You already tried to check the Password Never Expires and User Cannot Change The Password options in Active Directory Users and Computers?
Also, try to re-install the application on the machine. If the application cannot run as Windows Service, use the SRVANY.EXE utility to register you application.

Related

Sonos Sample Server Authentication Error

I am currently in the beginnings of developing an integrated Sonos app, and to get a better understanding of what needs to happen, I downloaded Sonos's provided sample server for the "Acme" service.
On first use, I was able to get it working and was able to play songs from the static directory that was provided within the package. However, after closing the server, leaving my computer for some time, and booting it back up again with ./gradlew bootRun, I noticed that I was not able to use the sample service anymore. On the window to link the sample account, it said that there was an error in authenticating and that it might be an issue with the connection.
First things first, I rebooted everything I could reboot. Turned the gradle server on then off. Removed the service and created it again. I even did a factory reset and put the Sonos device (PLAY:1 variety) on a different network at the office. The sample service still won't authenticate.
What could be causing the authentication for the sample Acme service to stop working just like that on every network? I should mention that I have been using the same config settings ever since I got it to work the first time, so it should not be a problem with my configurations in the customSD page. Also, I have not changed any code within the sample server.
TL;DR: The Sonos sample server worked one time for me, and hasn't worked since on multiple networks and devices, even after a factory reset. What could be causing this issue?
It sounds like the player possibly can't find the sample server any more. When you set up the service via customsd, you used an ip address for the endpoint. Is it possible that ip address has changed?

How to deploy an auto-updating WCF windows service?

I have a WCF Windows service that is used locally only. I need to deploy it in multiple sites and I need the option to auto update it - when an update is released, the service has to be able to get the new version and update itself.
The service will be used in Windows 7, so the permission issue needs to be taken into account somehow.
I have no experience with services and their deployment, feel free to explain thoroughly.
Edit
I've been considering ClickOnce since another application I'm writing is deployed using it. The thing is, ClickOnce only checks for updates on startup and Windows services are supposed to be up and running.
Is it possible to use the ClickOnce detection in my other app and then update the service? (Permission-wise)
Can ClickOnce start and stop the service?
Can the update be silent?
You have to take in account the expected availability of your service and the update policy for your application.
Besides that, you might want to take a look to:
Is there a way to check if a ClickOnce application is running the latest version
http://madprops.org/blog/Updating-ClickOnce-Application-Programatically/
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/xc3tc5xx.aspx
Cheers,

Performance issue when Apppool identity is Network Service on IIS 6.0

I have a very sluggish performance issue when a website is runnig under appPool identity configured to "Network Service" on IIS 6.0.
When i change the apppool identity to network account then the perofmrance is great.
Can you please suggest for any resolution for this issue?
It is curious to me that it would be slow--and this really isn't an answer. But the excellent and free Process Monitor tool from SysInternals can likely help you sort out what is going on.
Download it, and allocate 20 minutes to play with it--it may be within that time you can get to the root of your problem. And in the process you'll have a new tool in your toolbox that you can use to amaze and impress your friends.

How do I disable the network connection from .NET without needing admin privileges?

I may be SOL on this but I thought I would give throw it out for possible solutions.
I am writing a computer access control service to help me control my kids' computer use. Plan on open sourcing it when I have it working. It is written in VB.Net and needs to work on XP through 7.
I am running into all sorts of security and desktop access issues on Windows 7. The service needs to run as admin to execute the NetSh command to disable the network. But I cannot interact with the desktop from the service so I IPC to a UI to handle other stuff, but I still cannot detect from the service if the desktop is locked. Argghh!
I could get it all working from a hidden windows form app if I could just lick the one piece that needs admin permissions: disabling the network.
It does no good if a kid logs on and denies the popup asking if the program should run as administrator and he says no. Also windows 7 will not start a program set to run as admin using
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Anyone know how to get this working? Or have an outside the box solution?
I wish I could provide some references, but I'm failing at my google-fu right now... but I'm pretty sure UAC doesn't apply to services. If you implement your program as a windows service application instead of a (hidden) windows forms application, and set it up to run for your kids' user accounts and not your own, that should work.
UPDATE
Found this on google, haven't played with it at all. Looks sound though... basically, CreateProcessAsUser to run the forms app from your service app that's running as administrator.

Monitoring a Custom Service

I've created a service for one of my apps. How do i create a system tray component in VB.net that can be used to monitor the progress of the service? Is there a way to have this installed via tcpip on multiple client machines such as those that are for our employees?
We do exactly that here, with the server running a really basic HTTP server on a configurable port on a separate thread that returns status in an XML format (nothing else, just that) -- the client just uses a web request to get the XML, before parsing it and displaying it appropriately.
This approach also allows for future extensibility (detailed status, sending service control commands, adding an association to an XSLT file elsewhere for use with a normal web browser, etc.)
You could use WCF for this. Using WCF your service would open up an EndPoint which would expose status information to callers. You could then build a tray icon application that can be deployed to the employees workstations. The tray icon application could periodically poll the WCF service the your Windows Service is hosting and get status information. I know #Johan mentioned Remoting already and this is a similar approach. I'd recommend WCF though as the programming API is more simple, IMHO, and WCF will give you more flexibility with regards to network transports, etc.
I guess your question is not about how to actually do the "traybar"-thing, but how to communicate with the service to get the information you want to show in the monitor/traybar-program?
It can be done in many ways, API is one way, use sendmessage/postmessage/getmessage is one way to make 2 running programs communicate with each other without having to store anything in files or databases first.
DDE is another way. If it needs to do the stuff via net then there is something called NetDDE, but I havent done anything with NetDDE I cant help anything there.
But about the API and DDE, feel free to ask more questions if you want some clarification.
I'll take the second question: Is there a way to remotely install software on client machines?
Yes. However it is very dependent on your environment. For example, if you have an Active Directory domain, you can use group policy to force installation of software on the client boxes.
If you don't like that or if you aren't on active directory, you can buy something like Altiris to push installs down.
Another option would be to use login scripts which would run a custom program to detect if your program is installed and take appropriate action. But then you are probably better off buying Altiris.
For the comunication part, i have used remoting before, and this works very well. With a little bit of configuration, you can even get it working to another machine.