sp_who2

[Darkness84]

I have written a service (in C#) that reads and writes to an SQL database. At the begining of the service I execute sp_who2 to see if another computer connected to the same database is already running the service and if it is I stop the service. My problem is that the service is not showing up in the results of sp_who2. Do you have to initialise anything either in the database or my service for it to be displayed by sp_who2?

[kubben]

You would need to have an open connection to the database for it to show up. Normally you would not want a service to hold open a connection to the database just so you can tell it is running. Why not just create a sql table that the service can look at? Hope that helps. Ben

[Darkness84]

I thought of that but if one computer is running the service and crashes the service's state would still be set to running in the table and then no other computer would be able to run that service until the state was manually reset in the database.

[kubben]

Well, if it is that bad, then perhaps you should have the service on a regular basis insert a new record, so you know it is running. That way if the last record that was inserted was more then whatever time interval you decide on, you can have some certainty that the service has failed. Not a great solution, but it might work for you. Ben