Sign Up to our social questions and Answers Engine to ask questions, answer people’s questions, and connect with other people.
Login to our social questions & Answers Engine to ask questions answer people’s questions & connect with other people.
Lost your password? Please enter your email address. You will receive a link and will create a new password via email.
Please briefly explain why you feel this question should be reported.
Please briefly explain why you feel this answer should be reported.
Please briefly explain why you feel this user should be reported.
I have a Windows Service that is always running when the user starts their workstation. This Windows Service is critical and I would like to show a Balloon Notification in the Notification Area when certain things happen such as the Service Stops, Starts, Restarts etc.
For example:
Also, is there a way to show a Notification Area Icon for my Windows Service?
The days of Windows services interacting directly with the desktop are over, so you have to find another way.
What I have done is create a normal WinForms application that includes a NotifyIcon. The behavior of this application mimics that of Task Manager, such that it can be hidden from the task bar and only visible in the system tray. If I right-click the system tray icon, I get a menu. If I double-click the icon, the application window is shown.
To facilitate the communication between the WinForms application and the Windows service, I use WCF. Specifically, I use Juval Lowy‘s Publish-Subscribe Framework, which works really well for this kind of scenario. See my answer here for more details.
Hope this helps.