Service Startup Issues

Who This Is For

• Technical users deploying AutoDoctor through installer packages.
• Developers troubleshooting service wrapper runtime behavior.

Symptom Patterns

• Service shows Starting then times out.
• Service installs but does not transition to Running.
• debug mode logs show child process launch failures.

Fast Diagnostic Commands

Get-Service AutoDoctorAPI
sc.exe qc AutoDoctorAPI
Get-Content C:\ProgramData\AutoDoctor\logs\autodoctor_api.log -Tail 100
Invoke-RestMethod http://127.0.0.1:8000/health

Understand Runtime Modes

Mode is read from:

• C:\ProgramData\AutoDoctor\config\autodoctor.ini
• [Service] mode = bundled | system_python

Behavior:

• bundled: prefers autodoctor_api.exe
• system_python: prefers run_autodoctor.py via selected Python

Common Root Causes and Fixes

1) Bundled mode timeout after installer build from .venv

Cause:

• Packaged runtime mismatch or missing child-start prerequisites on target.

Fix:

1. Re-run installer and select Use system Python interpreter (advanced).
2. Ensure Python 3.12 + packages:
   • pywin32, fastapi, uvicorn
3. Reinstall service in system-Python mode.

2) System Python mode validation fails in installer

Fix:

py -3 --version
py -3 -m pip install pywin32 fastapi uvicorn

Optional explicit interpreter:

$env:AUTO_DOCTOR_SYSTEM_PYTHON = "C:\Python312\python.exe"

3) Service registered but child API does not launch

Checks:

• Confirm files exist:
  • <root>\server\api\autodoctor_service.exe
  • <root>\server\api\autodoctor_api.exe
  • <root>\server\api\run_autodoctor.py

Fix:

• Repair install by rerunning installer as Administrator.
• Validate AUTO_DOCTOR_HOME and AUTO_DOCTOR_CONFIG_INI are not pointing to stale paths.

Manual Service Re-registration

Bundled mode

cd C:\ProgramData\AutoDoctor\server\api
.\autodoctor_service.exe --startup auto remove
.\autodoctor_service.exe --startup auto install
.\autodoctor_service.exe start

System Python mode

cd C:\ProgramData\AutoDoctor\server\api
py -3 .\autodoctor_service.py --startup auto remove
py -3 .\autodoctor_service.py --startup auto install
py -3 .\autodoctor_service.py start

Verify Recovery

Get-Service AutoDoctorAPI
Invoke-RestMethod http://127.0.0.1:8000/health
Start-Process "http://127.0.0.1:8000/dashboard/"

Next Steps

• Service Runtime Modes
• Install with Inno Setup