Windows Server 2016 Scheduled Task Error

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Windows Server 2016 Scheduled Task Error

Diaz, John, A 1

Windows Server 2016 scheduled task ends with return code 2147942499. Runs to good EOJ if task is manually run.

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Answer 1

MotoX80 36,291

Runs to good EOJ if task is manually run.

Does that mean that if you right click the task in the Task Scheduler mmc app and select "run", that it executes ok?

Or does that mean that you have defined a task to execute some program or .bat file and when you run it interactively, like from a command prompt, that it executes ok?

If it's the latter, then you need to do basic troubleshooting. What program are you running? What account is the task defined to execute as? Are you capturing stdout and stderr? Does the application itself provide any logging features?

Diaz, John, A 1 Reputation point

2021-05-12T20:48:12.13+00:00

Right-click and 'run'.
The application that is running is a home grown implementation of WinSCP that downloads file from a bank. Since it's such a small app, I didn't add any logging or error capture. The task is setup to run as the MSA account for the console app; I'd hoped that the 2147942499 code was really an 'access denied' on the destination folder in disguise, but still not running even after adjusting the permission on the destination folder. Any clue on the 2147942499?
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-12T21:14:12.597+00:00

Any clue on the 2147942499?

Calc says that -2147942499 is 80070063. I didn't find much on that.

http://openssl.6102.n7.nabble.com/CAPI-Engine-doc-td75246.html
https://www.stunnel.org/pipermail/stunnel-users/2017-February/005720.html

Kinda fits in with a WinSCPish program (SSL related) but if you can right click and run the task, then I would be more suspicious of the task trigger or maybe the time of day that you've got it set to run.

Are you logged on to the desktop when it fails?

Try tracing it with Process Monitor and see if it gets any "access denied" events.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon
Diaz, John, A 1 Reputation point

2021-05-12T21:18:07.67+00:00

No, not logged on when it fails. Remoting into that box and running the task. It could be a time of day thing. Noon could be a popular time for things to happen, and by the time I get notified of the failure and I rerun it's 10-15 minutes later.
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-12T21:46:29.427+00:00

Are you using any COM objects that are set to run as "interactive"?

If you schedule the task to run in 5 minutes, and stay RDP'd in, does it run? Then schedule it to run in another 5 minutes and log out. Does it then fail?

If it's your code, I recommend adding in some basic logging. Start time, end time, calling major functions, etc.
Diaz, John, A 1 Reputation point

2021-05-12T21:59:34.117+00:00

I can add the logging, then see what happens after deploying to a non-production server.
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-12T22:47:43.18+00:00
Did you compile it as a command line or a GUI program? If it's command line, then have the task execute cmd.exe and have it execute a bat file where you redirect stdout and stderr.

Then all your program has to do is a console.write (for whatever language its written in).

set MyLog="c:\Logs\MyApp.%date:~10,4%%date:~4,2%%date:~7,2%.%time:~0,2%%time:~3,2%%time:~6,2%.log" echo MyApp is starting. %date% %time% 1>> %MyLog% 2>&1 MyApp.exe /someswitch 1>> %MyLog% 2>&1 set rc=%errorlevel% echo MyApp.exe ended RC=%rc% 1>> %MyLog% 2>&1
Diaz, John, A 1 Reputation point

2021-05-12T22:50:39.63+00:00

The application is a C# Console app. The Windows task scheduler is setup to call the .exe file as the 'what to do'.
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-12T23:08:18.287+00:00

Use a .bat file to call your .exe, that way you can redirect stdout and stderr to a log file.
Andy YOU 3,076 Reputation points

2021-05-14T09:51:35.727+00:00

HI DiazJohnA-6508,
1.When issue happen, is there any log about our issue?
C:\Windows\System32\winevt\Logs
System.evtx
application.evtx
Microsoft-Windows-TaskScheduler%4Operational.evtx
Microsoft-Windows-TaskScheduler%4Maintenance.evtx
2.Could you please share the task scheduler setting for your task scheduler?
3.Did you want to launch a C#app when the user logon ?
Diaz, John, A 1 Reputation point

2021-05-14T14:23:52.537+00:00

The logs all show the same 'unknown' return code. The Tash executes a c# console app at noon, daily. The issue appears to only happen when there is actually a file to download from Bank OF America. That's why I thought it was some sort of 'access denied' on the destination folder. I updated the permission s allow access to 'authenticated users', so that should take care of letting the MSA account the the application runs under access the folder. The task runs fine, if I remote into the server, right-click and run from the task scheduler.
MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-14T23:58:41.467+00:00

Don't guess as to what the error is. Use a .bat file so that you can capture any stdout/stderr that the console app might produce. Add try/catch error handling and logging into your code. You have to find out which statement within your code that is failing.
Andy YOU 3,076 Reputation points

2021-05-17T01:14:09.787+00:00

HI DiazJohnA-6508,

The issue appears to only happen when there is actually a file to download from Bank OF America. That's why I thought it was some sort of 'access denied' on the destination folder.
I think you can download and run network monitor/ Wireshark and process monitor on both local w2016 server and destination server, then wait the issue happen, finally check which process denied our download thread.

I am not sure if you can build a new test w2016(with the same C# application) and make sure it worked fine for your task scheduler so that we can capture the same network log and Procmon log. Finally, we can compare the difference between the normal log files and issue log files.

Microsoft Network Monitor 3.4
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=4865

Process Monitor v3.70
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon
Andy YOU 3,076 Reputation points

2021-05-17T01:23:39.147+00:00

HI DiazJohnA-6508，

Is there any log information (security, system, application in event viewer) recorded on Bank server when your task scheduler running on problematical w2016?
Andy YOU 3,076 Reputation points

2021-05-25T05:51:12.307+00:00

HI DiazJohnA-6508，
Is there any progress on your question?
Andy YOU 3,076 Reputation points

2021-05-31T14:14:07.09+00:00

HI DiazJohnA-6508，
Is there any progress on your question?

Answer 2

Amit Singh 5,306

Might want to add a /f to the command line to force the reboot. I don't know if this is the cause of that error, but I've seen where if a user is logged in, the scheduled task wouldn't run. The /f switch forced the reboot regardless.

MotoX80 36,291 Reputation points

2021-05-16T12:40:46.5+00:00

Nothing in this thread says anything about a reboot or a shutdown command.

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Windows Server 2016 Scheduled Task Error

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