We recently performed an upgrade on one of the applications that we use to monitor and manage client servers and devices. As a part of the upgrade process, we decided to move the application from servers running Windows Server 2003 to new virtual servers running Windows Server 2008. The application is configured with a series of tasks that run each day during the early morning hours. The tasks run under an Active Directory user account created solely for the purpose of running these tasks and with only the level of privilege required to perform this action.
After the upgrade it was discovered that the tasks were no longer running. I began to troubleshoot the problem. From within the application, I could right-click on a task and select to run a test job from the pop-up menu. The task completed successfully. If I selected the option to start the job in the context that it was to run each night, it failed consistently. So why were the test jobs succeeding when the actual tasks were failing? I turned to good, old Google and quicky found the root cause of the problem.
I discovered that tasks run in Windows Server 2008’s Task Scheduler, by default, run only when the user is logged onto the server. This was not the case with Scheduled Tasks in Windows Server 2003. To remedy the problem, I accessed Task Scheduler on the new server, right-clicked on each task and selected Properties from the pop-up menu. On the General tab of the task’s properties, I selected the Run whether user is logged on or not option as shown below, and then clicked the OK button. Now the tasks run nightly as expected.
Task Properties in Windows Server 2008
Although this subtle change in the way tasks are run in Windows Server 2008 is an improvement from a security standpoint, it can cause some head scratching if you are unaware of the change. I hope this post saves saves some administrators a little head scratching.
