Stopping/Starting a remote Windows service and waiting for it to open/close

Question

The top answer to this question tells me how to stop/start a remote service. Great. Now, all I need is to wait for the actual stop/start to complete. So, what I\'m looking f

Answer 1

I've never actually seen something that does this specifically but it would be quite easy to knock such a utility out in C\C#\VB or any other language that gives easy access to the Service API. Here's a sample of something in C#.

using System;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.ServiceProcess;

namespace SCSync
{
    class Program
    {
        private const int ERROR_SUCCESS = 0;

        private const int ERROR_INVALID_COMMAND_LINE = 1;
        private const int ERROR_NO_ACCESS = 2;
        private const int ERROR_COMMAND_TIMEOUT = 3;
        private const int ERROR_NO_SERVICE = 4;
        private const int ERROR_NO_SERVER = 5;
        private const int ERROR_INVALID_STATE = 6;
        private const int ERROR_UNSPECIFIED = 7;

        static int Main(string[] args)
        {

            if (args.Length < 2 || args.Length > 4)
            {
                ShowUsage();
                return ERROR_INVALID_COMMAND_LINE;
            }

            string serviceName = args[0];
            string command = args[1].ToUpper();
            string serverName = ".";
            string timeoutString = "30";
            int timeout;

            if (args.Length > 2)
            {
                if (args[2].StartsWith(@"\\"))
                {
                    serverName = args[2].Substring(2);
                    if (args.Length > 3)
                    {
                        timeoutString = args[3];
                    }
                }
                else
                {
                    timeoutString = args[2];
                }
            }

            if (!int.TryParse(timeoutString, out timeout))
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Invalid timeout value.\n");
                ShowUsage();
                return ERROR_INVALID_COMMAND_LINE;
            }

            try
            {
                ServiceController sc = new ServiceController(serviceName, serverName);
                switch (command)
                {
                    case "START":
                        sc.Start();
                        sc.WaitForStatus(ServiceControllerStatus.Running, new TimeSpan(0, 0, 0, timeout));
                        break;
                    case "STOP":
                        sc.Stop();
                        sc.WaitForStatus(ServiceControllerStatus.Stopped, new TimeSpan(0, 0, 0, timeout));
                        break;
                    case "PAUSE":
                        sc.Pause();
                        sc.WaitForStatus(ServiceControllerStatus.Paused, new TimeSpan(0, 0, 0, timeout));
                        break;
                    case "CONTINUE":
                        sc.Continue();
                        sc.WaitForStatus(ServiceControllerStatus.Running, new TimeSpan(0, 0, 0, timeout));
                        break;
                    default:
                        Console.WriteLine("Invalid command value.\n");
                        ShowUsage();
                        return ERROR_INVALID_COMMAND_LINE;
                }
            }
            catch (System.ServiceProcess.TimeoutException)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Operation timed out.\n");
                return ERROR_COMMAND_TIMEOUT;
            }
            catch (UnauthorizedAccessException)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("You are not authorized to perform this action.\n");
                return ERROR_NO_ACCESS;
            }
            catch (InvalidOperationException opEx)
            {
                Win32Exception winEx = opEx.InnerException as Win32Exception;
                if (winEx != null)
                {
                    switch (winEx.NativeErrorCode)
                    {
                        case 5: //ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED
                            Console.WriteLine("You are not authorized to perform this action.\n");
                            return ERROR_NO_ACCESS;
                        case 1722: //RPC_S_SERVER_UNAVAILABLE
                            Console.WriteLine("The server is unavailable or does not exist.\n");
                            return ERROR_NO_SERVER;
                        case 1060: //ERROR_SERVICE_DOES_NOT_EXIST
                            Console.WriteLine("The service does not exist.\n");
                            return ERROR_NO_SERVICE;
                        case 1056: //ERROR_SERVICE_ALREADY_RUNNING
                            Console.WriteLine("The service is already running.\n");
                            return ERROR_INVALID_STATE;
                        case 1062: //ERROR_SERVICE_NOT_ACTIVE
                            Console.WriteLine("The service is not running.\n");
                            return ERROR_INVALID_STATE;
                        default:
                            break;
                    }
                }
                Console.WriteLine(opEx.ToString());
                return ERROR_UNSPECIFIED;
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(ex.ToString());
                return ERROR_UNSPECIFIED;
            }

            return ERROR_SUCCESS;
        }

        private static void ShowUsage()
        {
            Console.WriteLine("SCSync usage:\n");
            Console.WriteLine("SCSync.exe service command  \n");
            Console.WriteLine("    service   The name of the service upon which the command will act. (Required)");
            Console.WriteLine("    command   The command to execute - one of: start|stop|pause|continue. (Required)");
            Console.WriteLine("    server    The name of the server on which the target service runs. This must start with \\. (Optional)");
            Console.WriteLine("    timeout   The timeout period in seconds in which the command should finish. The default is 30 seconds. (Optional)");
            Console.WriteLine("\n");
        }
    }
}

The WaitForStatus is just a polling loop and could be easily replaced in any other language. The rest is just OpenService and ControlService.