Is there an official GUI way of installing and removing .Net services on Windows Server 2008?

Question

Please read the whole question; I personally think that this is programming-related; if you think otherwise, then please migrate without down-voting.

I have found two different ways of installing a service: http://www.wsinnovations.com/softeng/support/manualservice.html

as well as using http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/50614e95(VS.80).aspx

The reason why I ask for this is that I am trying to debug a service which is somehow supposed to update itself. It is not currently working, but I was told that this did work in the past.

I have been using the sc delete <servicename> command to remove the service (because it is shorter that way), while installing it with an installutil command. I hope this does not result in any side-effects; I would like to rule those out.

Ideally, it should be possible to install and uninstall services right from the screen which lets the user start and stop them, but such option is not does not exist unfortunately. I am looking for the next best thing, which is a GUI wrapper for installutil.exe

Answer 1

Maybe have a look here to get an impression of the underlying API: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/255056/install-a-net-windows-service-without-installutil-exe

Answer 2

You could create an installer using one of the many installation frameworks out there. I personally use WiX and there are a bunch of examples out there about how to write these sorts of things.

Answer 3

No - not in the way I believe you're thinking of. The GUI way would be as part of an MSI or other installer, which calls the same APIs as installutil does.

So what you could do is write an installer which can run silently, and then use that to install and uninstall.