I am trying to build a Windows service with MingW. It need thread safe exceptions, so I added the linker flag -mthreads. The application works fine from the command-line, but when I try to start it from services.msc, the 1054 error ("The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion") is raised. The service starts if I re-build it without the -mthreads flag. How can I get this working with -mthreads?
A:
I wonder if you can debug it when it runs as a service. There must be something spooking your program when service host runs it. Perhaps try to attach a debugger to svchost.exe, at least you can see what modules are loaded and maybe which exception causes the crash.
Igor Zevaka
2009-09-17 02:27:52
Attaching a debugger to svchost.exe did not help. The service do not get a chance to start. The error is thrown even before that.
Vijay Mathew
2009-09-17 03:48:56
A:
Is your application even starting up at all? Put a call to OutputDebugString (or equivalent) at the start of your main function to see if it even gets that far. (Grab DbgView from SysInternals if you don't have it already.)
If it doesn't get that far, we start checking for the obvious: is it a matter of the application not finding the runtime DLL? It could be that you have the regular runtime in its PATH, but it can't find the MT version. That could explain the behaviour you describe. You may need to copy the MT runtime or update the PATH accordingly.
gavinb
2009-09-21 09:56:26
The application does not even start. But it runs from the command line. So it cannot be the problem with the runtime libraries.
Vijay Mathew
2009-09-21 13:53:23
Where is the MT version of the runtime libraries? It should be in the application directory. Perhaps the runtime libraries are available in the PATH when running as your user, but not as the system. Use depends.exe to track down which dll's you are depending on. You might also try running the app as another user.
Matthew Talbert
2009-09-21 17:43:29
+2
A:
I suspect -mthreads is bringing in a dependency on a DLL, and that DLL is not on the path when it's running as a service. In my cygwin environment, if I compile a trivial program with "-mno-cygwin -mthreads", I get a dependency on MINGWM10.DLL, which certainly wouldn't be on the path when running as a service. If I try running it with no PATH set, it crashes as it starts to load (and leaves a turd in the Application event log).
I'd be bringing up your exe in Dependency Walker (http://www.dependencywalker.com) to see what you're loading at load-time, and check your Windows Event Log to see if there are any hints there. You're probably going to need to put a copy of the DLLs it needs alongside the executable.
Martin
2009-09-23 05:19:00
+1
A:
You need mingwm10.dll in the working directory or in [edit: system, not per user] PATH, because C++ programs compiled with -mthread option have that dependency. If you're pretty sure exception will never be thrown by your code nor propogate through your stack, use -fno-exception instead of -mthread to resolve the dependency.
whatever
2010-01-25 07:47:43