Redgate Client Service Doesn't Start Automatically

Hank747

SQL Prompt fails to start most every time that I launch SSMS. It requires that I close SSMS and manually start the Redgate Client in Services. I checked my licensing and found it to be in order. I am running SSMS 2017 and SQL Prompt 8.0.10.2247.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated. This issue is annoying.

Jessica R

Hi @Hank747 ,

So sorry to hear you're running into this issue!

Can I just double check--from your Services panel, is the service set to start automatically? If it's set to Automatic, does it make any difference if you change it to Automatic (delayed)? Or vice versa? (Sometimes one works better than the other on certain machines.) Both options should make the service start when you boot up your machine.

If neither option helps though, it can unfortunately be quite difficult to get to the bottom of why a machine doesn't start a service automatically. However, what you can do is set up a task to start the service when you log on, which should start the service if the attempt on startup fails. You can do this via the following:

1. In Notepad, create a text file with the following line:
net start "RedgateClient"
2. Go to File>Save, change the save as type to "All types" and then save it with the filename StartRedgateClientService.bat
3. Open "Task Scheduler" on your machine.
4. From the right-hand side, click on "Create basic task".
5. Name the task "Start Redgate Client Service" and you can enter in "Starts the Redgate Client Service" as the description
6. Click Next and select "When I log on" as the trigger.
7. Click Next and select "Start a program" as the action
8. Click Next and enter in the path to the StartRedgateClientService.bat file as the Program/Script
9. Click Finish

I hope that helps--please let me know how you get on!

Hank747

Are you kidding?!?! Your suggestion for a bug in your software is a kludge? How about presenting the issue to your engineers and finding a solution so that the software works properly?

Of course I have tried both Automatic Startup options and I certainly could build a batch file and schedule a job. I do not pay annual support just to be told to configure a work around myself! I can manage starting the service until you fix it, but I should expect that a repair is due in a coming release. I might even suggest a "Restart Service" in the product menu. In the meantime, if you need to capture logs or do whatever else it is that you might like for information gathering, I am happy to assist you in troubleshooting the issue with YOUR software.

Jessica R

Hi @Hank747,

I'm so sorry if my reply came off unhelpful!

Just to clarify: when we install the service, we do set it to start automatically (Automatic), but I just wanted to make sure this hadn't changed somehow. The thing is that the service not starting automatically is likely an issue on the machine, rather than a bug in the service which can still start and run successfully. Windows sometimes just doesn't start services (Redgate or other) that you've told it to start automatically. If the service itself is throwing startup errors, then that explains things, but often it seems that Windows just doesn't try to start a service and it doesn't give any detail why.

That said, we should definitely check if the machine is actually encountering any errors when it tries to start the service and sorry for not checking that first. The next time you reboot, can you please go to Event Viewer>Windows log>Application and check for any errors related to the service? Can you please also check if a new log file is generated in C:\ProgramData\Red Gate\Shared Client\Log, and if so, send it to support@red-gate.com with subject "Logs for #98119"?

If there aren't any errors that show the service failing to start after the reboot though, it's unlikely a bug in the service itself, but I definitely agree that we should handle the situation better when it occurs. A "Restart Service" within the tools would be something really helpful to have in the tools and I've passed this on to our developers- thanks very much for your suggestion.

rlevine

This definitely seems to be something wrong with the software. We are experiencing this on all the machines that we have this installed on as well. Each time we reboot a machine, the Redgate Client DOES NOT START even though it is set to start automatically. Each Developer MUST manually start the services. Although, this would not prevent us from using the software (as it is AMAZING), it is EXTREMELY annoying and a patch to address would be most welcome.

Jessica R

Thanks for your feedback, @rlevine!

If our tools themselves could manually start the service when they detect that it's not running, that would definitely help and we'll hopefully have it implemented in the future.

So very sorry for the inconvenience in the meantime!

rlevine

That would be superb!!!
Please keep us posted.
Ty

MillhouseD

I have the same issue. Changing the service to Automatic (Delayed Start) worked for me.