Starting and Viewing the Remote Control Client Agent

Because the client-side Remote Control Agent is started when it is installed, you do not need to manually start it or place it in the Startup group. The listening agent (Wuser32.exe) is started in different ways depending on the platform.

Window NT

Wuser32 runs as a standard Windows NT service. This service appears as “SMS Remote Control Agent” in the Services list. By default, its startup type is set to Automatic. Because Wuser32 is a regular Windows NT service, you can use the net start or net stop commands in lieu of the Services list. When these two commands are used, either the full service name (“SMS Remote Control Agent”) or the short name (“Wuser32”) will work. Note that you need to have Administrator rights to start or stop this service.

Windows 95 and Windows 98

Wuser32 runs as a Windows 95 or Windows 98 pseudo-service. Because of this service-level context, it will not appear in the process list in Task Manager. You can only view this agent by using a third-party process viewer (in Window 95) or by double-clicking the System Information icon in Control Panel (in Windows 98). Wuser32 runs as a child process started by SMS Client Services (Clisvc95.exe), under the RunServices registry key. You can also start Wuser32 manually by running the Wuser32.exe executable file in the \%SystemRoot%\MS\SMS\Clicomp\Remctrl directory.

Windows 3.1x and WFW 3.11

Wuser is started as a function of Launch16 (Client Services 16). You cannot view this agent by pressing ALT+TAB; instead, you must use a third-party process viewer (such as WPS) to view it when it is running. However, you do not need to place it in the Startup group as in SMS 1.2. Instead, it is started under the control of the SMS Client Services for Win16 clients.

For more information about the different service-level implementations of the Remote Control (Wuser) listening agent, see “Stopping and Restarting Wuser and Wuser32” later in this chapter.