StartFileDownload - service vs. client?

[tmiranda]

I'm trying to use StartFileDownload on a Sage server running in service mode. The code snippit below runs correctly on my SageClient but when I run it on my server (running in service mode) it fails.

            try {
            status = Global.StartFileDownload("http://tmiranda.googlecode.com/files/JHM-Options.jpg", null, File.createTempFile("Test", ".tst"));
            if (status) System.out.println("**************WORKED");
            else System.out.println("**************FAILED");
            } catch (IOException e) {

            }

Any idea why this API would behave differently on the Client vs the server? I've tried everything I can think of to get this to work on my server

I know the {} after the catch() is empty, but it's is not throwing any exceptions and I wanted to strip the test code down to the bare minimum to isolate the problem.

[jphipps]

I wonder if the default temp directory is not set when running for a service and is having some issue with creating the temp file. Have you tried using the version you can specify the directory and setting the path for the file?

Thanks,
Jeff

[GKusnick]

The obvious first question is what login credentials does your service use and does it have permission to access the network? (LocalSystem does not.)

I would also add some debug code to print out the result of that call to File.createTempFile so you know exactly what arguments you're passing in.

You said no execptions are thrown, but have you checked the log to see if any are being caught internally? Best policy is to debug with a console window open so you can see exceptions as they happen, without having to search through log files later.

[tmiranda]

Jeff, Greg,

I've checked the tempFile and that is being created property. I put some test code in before what I posted that checks to see if it's readable, checks for writable, and then writes something to it to make sure. I thought it was the tempFile so I pretty much beat that issue to death.

I've got a console windows running, no exceptions that I can see.

I had not considered the login credentials for the service. It is set to LocalSystem so that's probably the answer.

Thank you.

[tmiranda]

Thinking about this a little more - How can Sage download files if the service is logged in as LocalSystem? That StartFileDownload method is what Sage uses to download updates, online videos, and other things that are remote. How can Sage use it when the service is logged in as LocalSystem?

I'm thinking the issue may be related to that fact that I'm actually using StartFileDownload from a thread spawned by a servlet. Maybe that's the difference?

[Fuzzy]

I don't think LocalSystem truly restricts network access, it restricts filesharing. Most services, even things like web servers and such, work fine in localsystem.

[tmiranda]

Update. I never could get this to work so I wrote my own method to download files.

I had to write the new method anyway because Sage's method is not reentrant and you have to make sure only one thread accesses the method at any given time.

Another day, another lesson learned.