When I clicked switch to Windows container in docker desktop, it's not working.
Need resolution for this issue.
I try to run an windows 10 application inside a windows servercore container.
The app can run without user input via COM-Interface (and without visible GUI), but it seems that it needs to load a hidden window in the background. When I start it on docker, the application log file indicates that it's stuck on starting this window.
Is there a way to make the app assume it successfully loaded the window?
All information I found so far was about users who want to see the GUI or about Linux/Windows combinations. None of that helped me.
I understand that desktop/GUI apps are not supported in Windows containers. They do run but there's no built-in way to interact with them. I had the following idea - maybe I could use the Desktop Sharing API (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/_rdp/) for this purpose, the idea is to run a desktop app, then run a sharing program that uses the Desktop Sharing API, and connect to it using a Desktop Sharing API viewing program from the host.
I had to do some recap about window stations and desktops, and I noticed that when starting the container with cmd in interactive mode, I'm logged with ContainerAdministrator as a service (logon type 5). I tried running some WinAPI functions that deal with desktops and winstation and got some access denied results, so I switched to running cmd as system.
The window station of the cmd process (and other child processes) is not the interactive WinSta0, but instead some other service window station, which makes sense since I'm logged on as a service, and I figured that I can't use this window station, so I used a little program I wrote to run notepad in Winsta0 in the Default desktop. Afterwards I ran another program that enumerates the windows on WinSta0\Default, and the notepad window does get enumerated and I also get it's title, so it's running somewhere.
So now I tried running the desktop sharing API program (also on WinSta0\Default). It runs and I can connect from the host, but I only get a black screen without anything on it. I also tried running a program that takes a screenshot of the windows but I get an empty bitmap.
So I thought maybe the Default desktop is not the active desktop, and by using the OpenInputDesktop function I could confirm it - the current desktop was the Winlogon desktop, so I used the SwitchDesktop function to switch to the Default desktop (I used OpenInputDesktop again to verify that it actually worked).
Unfortunately, this didn't change anything, I still get an empty screen and empty bitmaps.
I know that containers are built for micro services and are not supposed to run GUI apps and so, but still - is there a way to make this work? Or any ideas of what else I can check? Alternatively, if you know that it can't work - I would also be happy to hear a good technical explanation of why it doesn't work.
This question is similar to but different from Is it possible to run GUI apps in windows containers? in the following way: I do not wish to login and see the GUI. Instead, I would like to know if is possible to start a winforms or wpf application from the commandline inside of a Windows container. If it runs at all, what are the window/screen implications for the GUI application?
Perhaps I have an GUI application that starts listening on a port when a user clicks a button. And perhaps I want to test this application in an automated way, both with a script that triggers a GUI button click also running in the container, and a script that creates and runs a container with both the GUI app and the button clicker.
i've made a CLI app with node js.
How can i create a service who display it in a full screen terminal in case it crashes and need to be restarted?
I'm using lxterminal in a raspberry pi.
(Yes, i need the desktop environement for other reasons)
Thanks.