How to convert windows forms to windows service?

Question

Hi I have a windows forms app. and I would like to use it as a windows service. How can I do it? Best Regards.

Sam Hobbs · Answer

You also (I think) did not specify if this is for all applications in the system or just specific applications.

Sam Hobbs · Answer

I assume that it is possible for a service to get keystrokes at the device driver level but I do not know how and it would be different from what you are doing now. An alternative might be a system-wide low-level keyboard hook. I do not know if you can install them from a service but if you can then you are in business. Believe it or not the Microsoft web site is having problems at the moment at least for me so I cannot check it for you. I think the function to install hooks is SetWindowsSystemHookEx or something very much like that. You can use a system-wide low-level keyboard hook in C# so if you can do that in a service then you can test your code without making it a service then use the same code in a service as long as it is allowed in a service. I don't know the details of what you are doing to get a screen-shot but that will be more complicated. You might be able to solve that problem by another system-wide hook to hook messages sent to windows but in order to do that you must use a little unmanaged code (C++); there is no way to get around the need to have some unmanaged code for that. Without knowing what you need to do my guess is that processing messages would be too complicated. You can probably access windows (Windows windows) at the device driver level but it might require extra work to relate the data to the application.

Vulpes · Answer

Well you still need to interact with the desktop to capture keystrokes or a screen-shot. Also I've just remembered that the 'Allow service to interact with the desktop' flag no longer works in Vista and Window 7 for security reasons though it should work in XP if you're still using that.

Raysefo · Answer

Hi Vulpes Actually my UI is not visible so I don't care about the UI  since this applicaiton gets the key strokes and screen shots in background. Now do I have chance to convert? Best Regards.

Vulpes · Answer

The short answer is that you can't because windows services do not have a user interface. Moreover it's generally thought best if services don't interact with the desktop at all though there is a flag in the service's properties in the Management console which enables you to do this if you must. Of course none of this prevents you from rewriting the non-GUI aspects of the WF application as a service where feasible.