Services vs Scheduled Tasks

[MergeJono]

Hello,

First of all i want to say hello to everyone as this is my first post here! Good to meet everyone.

Secondly I was wondering about the differences between Services and Tasks. From what I have heard, read about services in windows 7 it seems that they run in an isolates session (I think session 0) which does not allow them to perform certain tasks. For one application I know that they cannot access a GPU for instance...or thats what it seems.

Are scheduled tasks the same in that even though you can run them under a user they run in this constricted environment? What is the difference between them?

thanks everyone!
Jono

 

[Dwarf]

Hi Jono and welcome to Windows 7 Forums

Services are routines that run in the background and provide much of the core functionality of the OS. A scheduled task is, as its name implies, a means to run an application provided certain criteria are met (these being the triggers). Any application, such as Notepad, Calculator, Paint, etc, can be run manually and/or as a scheduled task. More often than not the applications that you want to set up as a scheduled task are housekeeping ones, and indeed many AVs automatically set up a schedule when they are installed.

 

[richc46]

Welcome Jono
To supplement the excellent information provided by Dwarf, may I suggest that you type task scheduler, in search (by start button). If you view task scheduler you can see all the tasks that are scheduled on your computer. One example would be System Restore, scheduled once a week by default.

 

[MergeJono]

Thanks Dwarf and richc46!

I will look into what tasks are already there and continue to research how they work.

Much appreciated,
Jono

 

[Dwarf]

You're welcome, Jono.

If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask. We'll be happy to answer them to the best of our knowledge.

 

[richc46]

Any questions be sure to post. Our members would enjoy sharing their expertise with you.

 

[jerzdevs]

Killing A Service

I can't find a way to force a service to be killed; would anyone know? I currently have a service on 2008 64bit servers which simply will not stop even if I try to stop it manually. If I reboot, and immediately try to stop the service, same error (1067).