Install Windows Service created in Visual Studio

Question

When I create a new Windows Service in Visual Studio 2010  I get the message stating to use InstallUtil and net start to run the service   I have tried the following steps    Create new project File -  New -  Project -  Windows Service Project Name  TestService Build project as is  Service1 constructor  OnStart  OnStop  Open command prompt  run  C  Windows Microsoft NET Framework v4 0 30319 InstallUtil exe  TestService exe Run net start TestService    Output of step 4     Running a transacted installation       Beginning the Install phase of the installation       See the contents of the log file for the   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio    2010 Projects TestService TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe   assembly s progress       The file is located at C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects Tes   tService TestService obj x86 Debug TestService InstallLog       Installing assembly  C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestS ervice TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe        Affected parameters are       logtoconsole        logfile   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestService T   estService obj x86 Debug TestService InstallLog      assemblypath   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestServ ice TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe      No public installers with the RunInstallerAttribute Yes attribute   could be found  in the C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestService TestSe rvice obj x86 Debug TestService exe   assembly       The Install phase completed successfully  and the Commit phase is   beginning       See the contents of the log file for the   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio    2010 Projects TestService TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe   assembly s progress       The file is located at C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects Tes   tService TestService obj x86 Debug TestService InstallLog       Committing assembly  C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestS ervice TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe        Affected parameters are       logtoconsole        logfile   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestService T   estService obj x86 Debug TestService InstallLog      assemblypath   C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestServ ice TestService obj x86 Debug TestService exe      No public installers with the RunInstallerAttribute Yes attribute   could be found  in the C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio   2010 Projects TestService TestSe rvice obj x86 Debug TestService exe   assembly       Remove InstallState file because there are no installers       The Commit phase completed successfully       The transacted install has completed    Output of step 5  The service name is invalid   More help is available by typing NET HELPMSG 2185

User · Answer

Two typical problems    Missing the ProjectInstaller class  as  MiguelAngelo has pointed  The command prompt must    Run as Administrator

User · Answer

You need to open the Service cs file in the designer  right click it and choose the menu-option  Add Installer    It won t install right out of the box    you need to create the installer class first   Some reference on service installer   How to  Add Installers to Your Service Application  Quite old    but this is what I am talking about   Windows Services in C   Adding the Installer  part 3   By doing this  a ProjectInstaller cs will be automaticaly created  Then you can double click this  enter the designer  and configure the components    serviceInstaller1 has the properties of the service itself  Description  DisplayName  ServiceName and StartType are the most important  serviceProcessInstaller1 has this important property  Account that is the account in which the service will run    For example   this serviceProcessInstaller1 Account   ServiceAccount LocalSystem

User · Answer

Another possible problem  which I ran into    Be sure that the ProjectInstaller class is public  To be honest  I am not sure how exactly I did it  but I added event handlers to ProjectInstaller Designer cs  like   this serviceProcessInstaller1 BeforeInstall    new System Configuration Install InstallEventHandler this serviceProcessInstaller1 BeforeInstall    I guess during the automatical process of creating the handler function in ProjectInstaller cs it changed the class definition from   public class ProjectInstaller   System Configuration Install Installer  to  partial class ProjectInstaller   System Configuration Install Installer  replacing the public keyword with partial  So  in order to fix it it must be  public partial class ProjectInstaller   System Configuration Install Installer  I use Visual Studio 2013 Community edition

User · Answer

Stealth Change in VS 2010 and  NET 4 0 and Later  No public installers with the RunInstallerAttribute Yes attribute could be found   There is an alias change or compiler cleanup in  NET that may reveal this little tweak for your specific case   If you have the following code          RunInstaller true       old alias     You may need to update it to   RunInstallerAttribute true      new property spelling   It is like an alias changed under the covers at compile time or at runtime and you will get this error behavior   The above explicit change to RunInstallerAttribute true  fixed it in all of our install scenarios on all machines   After you add project or service installer then check for the    old    RunInstaller true  and change it to the new RunInstallerAttribute true

User · Answer

Here is an alternate way to make the installer and get rid of that error message  Also it seems that VS2015 express does not have the  Add Installer  menu item   You simply need to create a class and add the below code and add the reference System Configuration Install dll   using System Configuration Install  using System ServiceProcess  using System ComponentModel    namespace SAS        RunInstaller true       public class MyProjectInstaller   Installer               private ServiceInstaller serviceInstaller1          private ServiceProcessInstaller processInstaller           public MyProjectInstaller                            Instantiate installer for process and service              processInstaller   new ServiceProcessInstaller                serviceInstaller1   new ServiceInstaller                    The service runs under the system account              processInstaller Account   ServiceAccount LocalSystem                  The service is started manually              serviceInstaller1 StartType   ServiceStartMode Manual                  ServiceName must equal those on ServiceBase derived classes              serviceInstaller1 ServiceName    SAS Service                   Add installer to collection  Order is not important if more than one service              Installers Add serviceInstaller1               Installers Add processInstaller

User · Answer

Yet another catch I ran into  ensure your Installer derived class  typically ProjectInstaller  is at the top of the namespace hierarchy  I tried to use a public class within another public class  but this results in the same old error   No public installers with the RunInstallerAttribute Yes attribute could be found

User · Answer

Looking at      No public installers with the RunInstallerAttribute Yes attribute could be found in the C  Users myusername Documents Visual Studio 2010 Projects TestService TestSe rvice obj x86 Debug TestService exe assembly    It looks like you may not have an installer class in your code   This is a class that inherits from Installer that will tell installutil how to install your executable as a service   P s   I have my own little self-installing debuggable Windows Service template here which you can copy code from or use  Debuggable  Self-Installing Windows Service

[c#] Install Windows Service created in Visual Studio

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