I have an old VB6 nt service that has a UI. The idea was that the service would start automatically before user logs in. It's a monitoring/logging system for some external devices. If a user logs in to the computer the UI form would pop into the foregound. user couldn't do anything, it's just a display of the status of the service and attached devices.
I've now re-written this in .Net. The service itself has no UI at all. Instead of displaying to a UI it pumps out status info as UDP to IP 127.0.0.1 (Loopback). It's just a one way thing. Never expects a reply and doesn't care if anyone is listening.
When a user logs in he starts a program that receives those messages and displays the status. From the user point of view this is exactly the same as it was in the old days.
My question - is IP loopback the best way to do this ? On Win8 I get firewall prompt which I'd like to avoid. Is there some other recommended way that a service (System) without a UI can send messages to a user/form application ? (Without using the API 'Window messaging' stuff that was common in 'the old days')
Thanks
Ax
I've now re-written this in .Net. The service itself has no UI at all. Instead of displaying to a UI it pumps out status info as UDP to IP 127.0.0.1 (Loopback). It's just a one way thing. Never expects a reply and doesn't care if anyone is listening.
When a user logs in he starts a program that receives those messages and displays the status. From the user point of view this is exactly the same as it was in the old days.
My question - is IP loopback the best way to do this ? On Win8 I get firewall prompt which I'd like to avoid. Is there some other recommended way that a service (System) without a UI can send messages to a user/form application ? (Without using the API 'Window messaging' stuff that was common in 'the old days')
Thanks
Ax