Check for a process per user VB

[mungyun]

I posted this on several vb forums with no avail so i figure i would post here because i have always gotten better help here than anywhere else.

I have an application on a terminal server that runs for each user as upon login and is intended to always be running for them. The problem i found out was that if they didnt logout and just disconnected then reconnected, another instance of this app would run as well as the currently running one, so on and so forth. I then added this simple code:

Dim Proc As System.Diagnostics.Process
If proc.Length > 1 And Environment.UserName = Employee.NTUserName Then
    MsgBox("Another instance of TimeClock is already running. Terminating.")
    End
End If

That does what i want but it doesnt care about multiple users using the app. It looks and if more than one instance is running for all users then it will end so only one user can use it at any time. I need to check if more than one instance is running per user.

Another thing i tried is this:

Dim processList As System.Diagnostics.Process()
Dim thisProc As System.Diagnostics.Process = System.Diagnostics.Process.GetCurrentProcess
Dim thisSessionID As Long = thisProc.SessionId

processList = System.Diagnostics.Process.GetProcesses()
Dim Proc As System.Diagnostics.Process

Dim count As Integer = 0

For Each Proc In processList
     If Proc.SessionId = thisSessionID And Proc.ProcessName = "LSTimeClock.exe" Then
     count += 1
     End If

     If count > 1 Then
          MsgBox("There is another instance of LSTimeClock Running")
          End
     End If

This code looks like it should do what i want but it doesnt. I fairly recently got thrown into vb programming and for terminal services for that matter so there are lots of extra things i didnt expect like this.

Any help would rock.

Thx
Mung

[Aardpsymon]

If Proc.SessionId = thisSessionID And Proc.ProcessName = "LSTimeClock.exe"

Well, the error is clearly in that line. Its not the old "==" thing is it? number of times I have forgotten to put ==...(not done vb in ages, so it might not be that)

Another solution might be to put a file in the user's home area and then lock it for editing. On startup if the file is locked, die.

[WolfeTone]

The line of code is grand, in VB it's = and not ==.

And I think the lock file would be the ideal solution.

[SirDice]

They've invented semaphores for this.

Another way to solve it would be to run the program as a service. That way it'll always be running, even if there are no users logged on.

[mungyun]

SirDice, can a service have a system tray icon for every user to interact with? If so, then i would definitely do that.

Aard and Wolfe, It sound pretty easy to do what you suggest, just have some file created by the app and do a check for that each time. I will probably do that for a quick fix but I really think that there has to be a way to see all of the processes for any specific user. If task manager can show users and their processes there has to be some code in the .NET framework that can do the same.

Either way, thanks for the ideas and if anyone happens to know the fix im looking for, i would love to know.
Thx

[sec_ware]

Hi

I would also expect your little script to work - what is the reason it does not work?

Although the approach itself is not exactly the most elegant way (check
SirDice's remarks!), it is an interesting issue just by itself. Thus:



There are other ways to enumerate the running processes supplemented with
the SessionId and the Owner. Try them, maybe one will work for you.

1. WMI

Add a reference to windows.management and try the following
(example for illustrative purposes - you will figure out the rest)

Dim ms As New ManagementObjectSearcher("SELECT * FROM Win32_Process")
        For Each mo As ManagementObject In ms.Get
            If CUInt(mo.InvokeMethod("GetOwner", args)) = 0 Then
                Dim objExecutablePath As Object = mo.Properties("ExecutablePath").Value

                If Not objExecutablePath Is Nothing Then
                    Console.WriteLine((args(1).ToString & "\" & args(0).ToString))
                    Console.WriteLine(objExecutablePath.ToString)
                    Console.WriteLine(mo.Properties("SessionId").Value.ToString)
		    Console.WriteLine()
                End If
            End If
        Next

2. WTSQuerySessionInformationW

You get access to that function by a dllimport

<DllImport("Wtsapi32.dll")> _
        Public Shared Function WTSQuerySessionInformationW(ByVal hServer As IntPtr, ByVal SessionId As Integer, ByVal WTSInfoClass As Integer, ByRef ppBuffer As IntPtr, ByRef pBytesReturned As IntPtr) As Boolean
    End Function

Then, for illustrative purposes

    Friend Shared WTS_CURRENT_SERVER_HANDLE As IntPtr = IntPtr.Zero
    Friend Shared WTS_UserName As Integer = 5

 (...)

    Dim procs As Process() = Process.GetProcesses()
        For Each proc As Process In procs
            If proc.ProcessName <> "Idle" Then
                Dim AnswerBytes As IntPtr
                Dim AnswerCount As IntPtr
                If WTSQuerySessionInformationW(WTS_CURRENT_SERVER_HANDLE, proc.SessionId, WTS_UserName, AnswerBytes, AnswerCount) Then
                    Dim userName As String = Marshal.PtrToStringUni(AnswerBytes)
                    Console.WriteLine(userName)
                    Try
                        Console.WriteLine(proc.MainModule.FileName)
                    Catch ex As Exception
                    End Try
                    Console.WriteLine(proc.SessionId)
                    Console.WriteLine()
                Else
                    Console.WriteLine("Could not access Terminal Services Server.")
                End If
            End If
        Next

Note the ugly Try-Catch in the latter - for processes like 'system' there is no MainModule.FileName defined.

I quickly tested these approaches in a terminal server environment
(several sessions with different users, several sessions with the same user)
Good luck



As per vb.net services with a system tray icon:
google for "vb.net service system tray icon"
and you will find plenty of examples


Cheers

[SirDice]

Just a bit of pseudo code:

if mysemaphore == 1 then
    # It's already running
    exit;
endif
    mysemaphore =1; # set it so other instances know it's running
    ...
    rest of code


    # cleanup
    mysemaphore = 0; # we're quiting
    exit;

[delstar]

Sec had it right with the WMI. That'd probably be the best way to go about it.

[mungyun]

Aw sweet sec, thats exactly what i was looking for. A coworker said he remembers a way to query for processes but couldnt remember what it was called and i didnt even think he was right. Im gonna go ahead and figure out the code, looks pretty straight forward. Hopefully i can get it to work... Never thought i would be doing windows programming at a web design company but meh, whaddya gonna do?

I would also expect your little script to work - what is the reason it does not work?

Well kinda funny, I thought it was working because nobody had said anything in the whole week i was live tesing it but that was because only one person was using it and the beginning of the next week i get a call saying hey, only one person can use this.

all it was doing was looking to see if more than one of that process was running. didnt matter which user was running it but it would kill itself if more than one instance was running.

Thanks all for your help!