When does the service's OnShutDown() gets called ?

[madankarmukta]

Hi ,

I want to commit the chages/ want to do some activity on service's OnShutuDown().But i found that It neven get's called ..when i shut down the system or when i power it off..in Both the cases call to OnShutDown not found.
I have my application running on Vista\Win server 2008 . CAn anybody tell me when does this OnShutDown() gets called.. ?

Thanks!

[balabaster]

I want to commit the chages/ want to do some activity on service's OnShutuDown().But i found that It neven get's called ..when i shut down the system or when i power it off..

On the contrary - OnShutDown() (when spelled correctly) gets called when the services is requested to stop. If it's not being called then something is stopping your service from closing down in a timely manner. I couldn't begin to hazard a guess at what that is without seeing any code.

The only thing I can think of is when you shut the system down it's slightly different than when you tell the service to stop in the services applet, in that if the service doesn't stop within the specified time frame - I think the default is 1 minute...unless you have Exchange Server installed and it is changed by default to 10 minutes (600000 milliseconds). Once this timeout occurs the service processes are terminated in an uncontrolled fashion, frequently their shutdown process isn't complete successfully, and in some cases the shutdown process isn't even started before the process is killed.

Sadly, I'm not sure if there's a way around this... maybe extend the timeout period to give your service more time to close. It requires a mod to the registry, so careful...

Here's the registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\WaitToKillServiceTimeout

Just increase the value (remember, it's in milliseconds, so setting it to 60 thinking you're setting it to a minute won't help the situation). Of course, don't be shocked when it takes Windows longer to go down for a reboot.

[madankarmukta]

Thanks for the update ..

You mean to say for every service there is the timeperiod defind under WaitToKillServiceTimeout value in the registry which stops the service after this much period of time .. Right ..?

Ohh.. Thanks..

But I am a bit crazy about .. As you guessed .. that there might be something which is resisting my service from stoping in timely manner..If this is the case , what if there is the service with WaitToKillServiceTimeout as 600000 , after every 10 minutes the servic's OnStutdown() should get called..i.e. The Logs should get printed .. as i did in my test application ..If I have not mistaken you point..Please correct me if I am wrong.

If there is something which is stoping my service in the timely manner.. what could be it.. Can you please help me.. can you give me any suggestions ..

As per as the code is concern..
I created the simple windows service .. overrided OnStop(), OnShutDown(),OncustomeCommand() fun.. Rest are the common.. constructors.. etc.

Please let me know your feedback over this..

Again thank you..

[r035198x]

On the contrary - OnShutDown() (when spelled correctly) gets called when the services is requested to stop....

I may have misunderstood the response but OnshutDown gets executed when the operating system is shutdown rather than when the service is stopped.

[madankarmukta]

I may have misunderstood the response but OnshutDown gets executed when the operating system is shutdown rather than when the service is stopped.

Thanks for the Reply ..
But it doesn't get called when the systemt gets shut down..

Thanks!

[PRR]

OnShutDown() : get called when windows operating system is shutting down..
OnStop(): when the service is stopped either manually or otherwise...


To check for this try writing to a text file... onstart onstop n on shutdown...
Incase it doesnt seem to be working then there may be some error in the code ...
For best results use threads...

[madankarmukta]

Sory.. But it OnShutDown() never gets called when operating system get's shut down ..

Thanks!

[PRR]

Sory.. But it OnShutDown() never gets called when operating system get's shut down ..

Thanks!

Can u post some code ? wat have you written on ur onshutdown()? try this

[HTML]
public void OnShutDown()
{
Thread t2 = new Thread(new ThreadStart(this.Write));
t2.IsBackground = true;

t2.Start();
}

public void Write()
{
using (StreamWriter sw = File.CreateText(@"c:\DD" +".txt"))
{
sw.WriteLine("This is my file.");

sw.Close();
}


}
[/HTML]

[madankarmukta]

Can u post some code ? wat have you written on ur onshutdown()?

Yes sure.. here is the OnshutDown which i overrriden..

protected override void OnShutdown()
{
//I am creating this file only for the windows version greater than 5.x
StreamWriter sw = File.CreateText(FILE_SHUTDOWN);
sw.WriteLine("System Shutdown");
sw.Close();
}

The problem coming is FILE_SHUTDOWN is not gettong created .. which i am interested in

Thanks!

[madankarmukta]

Can u post some code ? wat have you written on ur onshutdown()? try this

[HTML]
public void OnShutDown()
{
Thread t2 = new Thread(new ThreadStart(this.Write));
t2.IsBackground = true;

t2.Start();
}

public void Write()
{
using (StreamWriter sw = File.CreateText(@"c:\DD" +".txt"))
{
sw.WriteLine("This is my file.");

sw.Close();
}


}
[/HTML]

Hi,

I added your code into my service. Rebuild it.. Then I shut down the system..
Restart it.. But not found the fil;e DD.txt..Was I wrong anywhere while validating the workaround.

Thanks!

[PRR]

What account your service is running? in my service .. on shut down i had written code which did something like serializing n de-serializing class n writing log file... it worked alright... try n run the service under an account that can write files to disk...or to event logs..

[madankarmukta]

What account your service is running? in my service .. on shut down i had written code which did something like serializing n de-serializing class n writing log file... it worked alright... try n run the service under an account that can write files to disk...or to event logs..

ohh.. Thanks!

Soryy for saying.. But still it's not working.. :(

Thanks!

[balabaster]

ohh.. Thanks!

Soryy for saying.. But still it's not working.. :(

Thanks!

Hmm, untested thoughts: I'm wondering if one of a couple of things are occurring:
1). The system shutdown is preventing new threads from starting, and consequently it's preventing your thread which writes to the file from starting.
2). The completion of the shutdown of your service is occurring before the write thread completes and thus causes the thread to abort in an uncontrolled fashion without completing it's task - somewhat similar to forcing an application to exit before all threads are complete. The application doesn't wait for the threads to complete, it just aborts them all.

You could test either of these theories by calling the write method directly in your OnShutdown() a la:

protected override void OnShutdown()
{
  streamwriter sw = new file.CreateText("c:\myfile.txt");
  sw.WriteLine("OnShutdown method fired...");
  sw.close;
}

It's a shot in the dark, I really have no clue what is causing the problem, as it appears to me that your code is logically sound.

[madankarmukta]

Hmm, untested thoughts: I'm wondering if one of a couple of things are occurring:
1). The system shutdown is preventing new threads from starting, and consequently it's preventing your thread which writes to the file from starting.
2). The completion of the shutdown of your service is occurring before the write thread completes and thus causes the thread to abort in an uncontrolled fashion without completing it's task - somewhat similar to forcing an application to exit before all threads are complete. The application doesn't wait for the threads to complete, it just aborts them all.

You could test either of these theories by calling the write method directly in your OnShutdown() a la:

protected override void OnShutdown()
{
  streamwriter sw = new file.CreateText("c:\myfile.txt");
  sw.WriteLine("OnShutdown method fired...");
  sw.close;
}

It's a shot in the dark, I really have no clue what is causing the problem, as it appears to me that your code is logically sound.

Ohh Thanks..

I will try to test as you suggested..

I have some doubts to ask you.. about your very first answer to my post..
Here is that:


You mean to say for every service there is the timeperiod defind under WaitToKillServiceTimeout value in the registry which stops the service after this much period of time .. Right ..?

Ohh.. Thanks..

But I am a bit crazy about .. As you guessed .. that there might be something which is resisting my service from stoping in timely manner..If this is the case , what if there is the service with WaitToKillServiceTimeout as 600000 , after every 10 minutes the servic's OnStutdown() should get called..i.e. The Logs should get printed .. as i did in my test application ..If I have not mistaken you point..Please correct me if I am wrong.

If there is something which is stoping my service in the timely manner.. what could be it.. Can you please help me.. can you give me any suggestions ..

As per as the code is concern..
I created the simple windows service .. overrided OnStop(), OnShutDown(),OncustomeCommand() fun.. Rest are the common.. constructors.. etc.


About OS : My service running on Windows serverv 2008 / Vista

Please let me know your feedback over this..

Thanks

[balabaster]

Ohh Thanks..

I will try to test as you suggested..

I have some doubts to ask you.. about your very first answer to my post..
Here is that:


You mean to say for every service there is the timeperiod defind under WaitToKillServiceTimeout value in the registry which stops the service after this much period of time .. Right ..?

Ohh.. Thanks..

But I am a bit crazy about .. As you guessed .. that there might be something which is resisting my service from stoping in timely manner..If this is the case , what if there is the service with WaitToKillServiceTimeout as 600000 , after every 10 minutes the servic's OnStutdown() should get called..i.e. The Logs should get printed .. as i did in my test application ..If I have not mistaken you point..Please correct me if I am wrong.

If there is something which is stoping my service in the timely manner.. what could be it.. Can you please help me.. can you give me any suggestions ..

As per as the code is concern..
I created the simple windows service .. overrided OnStop(), OnShutDown(),OncustomeCommand() fun.. Rest are the common.. constructors.. etc.


About OS : My service running on Windows serverv 2008 / Vista

Please let me know your feedback over this..

Thanks

The WaitToKillServiceTimeout is only (as far as I'm aware) evaluated as the system is shutting down - I don't believe it is constantly revisited throughout the lifetime of the Windows Session, just the one time as you're closing down.

When you ask the system to restart/shutdown, it issues the shutdown command to each of the active services and then waits either for the period specified in the registry key (oddly, it doesn't appear to shutdown earlier if all the processes are shut down successfully prior to the completion of that time period), so for instance, if you have Exchange installed, and the WaitToKillServiceTimeout has been increased to 10 minutes, but on shutdown all the services still complete their shutdown processes in let's say 2 minutes and 30 seconds...the system still sits there and dutifully waits the full 10 minutes - whoever's idea that was, was a genius (note the sarcasm in my voice). Once the period has elapsed, the system indiscriminately kills all remaining active services thus removing them from memory in whatever state they were in, at the time they were killed.

Now, if something is preventing your service shutting down in a timely manner, I'm not sure and not really able to tell. The only way to really figure this out is to have the very first statements in your OnShutdown() method to spit out some form of output to say that the shutdown method has at least been called. Whether or not it shuts down in a timely manner is due to whatever other code is inside your method. If it never reaches the end of the method, then it is deemed to have not shut down in a timely manner and will be killed off when the WaitToKillServicesTimeout period has elapsed... but at the very least, some of the calls inside the method should have been executed.