How to install a .Net based Windows Service using InstallUtil.exe, see its status, start/stop it

How to Install a Windows Service Using InstallUtil and command prompt from Naeem Akram on Vimeo.




A demo day be really frustrating or it can be the happiest day of an IT professional's life.
Now I'm going to demonstrate the stuff which we've created so far in this course

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The windows service solution is already open
I'll go and click build and build solution
Now I'm going to expand solution explorer
And click the button , "Show all Files"
Next I'm going to expand the "bin" folder
 then I'll right click the "debug" folder and select "open folder
 location"
 Take a brief look at the contents of this folder
The file Udemy Windows Service dot exe is going to run as our service.
For this purpose, we're going to use installutil.exe
It is shipped along with Microsoft .Net framework.
For this purpose I'm going to launch the developer command prompt
I'll click the Windows Button and type "Developer command prompt"
The developer command prompt for vs is showing on top
I'll right click this shortcut and select menu option "Run as
administrator"
Now I'm going to type the command installutil.exe space -i space
And then the path of the file which we want to install as a service.
I'll go back to the debug folder and shift right click the Udemy
Windows Service .exe file
I'll select the context menu option "Copy as path"
Now I'll go back to the command prompt windows
I'll right click it and select context menu option edit
And then select Paste

The full command is installtuil.exe pace minus i space path of
our windows service exe file
I will hit enter key on command prmopt

The system shows that the commit phase completed successfuly

Let us see if the service is showing up service control managter
or not
I'll open the SCM by pressing Windows R and typing services.msc
Inside the name column, I'll look for Udemy Demo Service
We can click inside the name column and press Udemy
You can see our very own Windows Service named "Udemy Windows Service"
 along with the descritpion
"My hello world servoce" right here
And it has got logon as "Local System"
You'll see that status of the service will change to "Running"
The actions button on top right will also change from start to stop
 and restart
I'm now going to click the stop link and that should stop the service
without any fuss
You see a progress bar popup
And the service status is changed to stopped.
That is it for this video
In the next one we'll take a look at the event log

Framework vs IDE

Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 is an IDE(Integrated Development Environment), whereas Microsoft .Net 4.5 is a Platform.
Android is a Framework/Operating System, and Eclipse is an IDE.
I started off with solid examples of framework and IDE since I believe these will facilitate further explanation.

Putting the term IDE in perspective?

It is a group of various tools  which work together to compile a computer program, and create an executable package.

For example, on Windows we have Microsoft Visual Studio in which you can create a project and write some code. You just need to click a button or two and an execute-able file with extension .exe will be generated which you could take to any suitable computer and run.

Another example Android platform, you can write some code in C++ or maybe Java and use an IDE of your choice which might be Eclipse, Android Studio, or any other and click a few buttons, an executable package or .apk will be created for you which you may copy to any suitable Android device, install and run right away.

Explaining Integrated Development Environment

When we click a button inside an IDE and order it to create a nice package for us, a lot of things happen in the background. For example code of both .Net and Java languages need to be converted into a "byte code" which is then interpreted by the Java Machine/Common Language Runtime. There is a software tool which performs this task.

But before going on with the conversion, someone needs to make sure that the code supplied as the brick and mortar of your awesome software is correct or not. Incorrect code cannot be used to generate correct software. You must have guessed it by now, there is a separate tool which performs the job of error checking and compiling.
Yet another tools is the notepad like editor in which you type code, it automatically makes the code look pretty and colorful. This part is called "pretty printer" and it too is a separate tool.
There are numerous other tools, but let's just stop here and imagine that we got only three tools

1. One that makes the code look pretty as we type it
2. One that's responsible for making sure that our code is correct
3. One that makes a software package (.exe or .apk) out of our correct code

All three of these tools need to work together and cooperate, and do their job in an integrated fashion so that you can retain your development job.

When various tools work together in an integrated fashion, we get an integrated environment for development. Just to make things look uglier, an Integrated Development Environment.

Framework Explained

A framework is a set of various software tools and standards which work together and make a computer programmer's job easy. A framework might contain things like

1. Application Programming Interface (API)
2. Just in time (JIT) compiler
3. Virtual machine (JVM/CLR)
4. Standards for making various language work together e.g. CTS or common type system(C#, F#, C++/CLI)

For a detailed description of framework, examples, and comparison with API please see following article:

http://aprogrammersday.blogspot.com/2009/02/difference-between-framework-and-api.html

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