We have a server that hosts a service (I'll call it "tomato").
Up until now, a client pc has been able to start and stop this service. They just double-click a batch file, and inside that batch file is the command
net stop tomato
or
net start tomato
They recently got a new physical computer, and now those same commands fail with the error:
C:\>net stop tomato
The service name is invalid.
More help is available by typing NET HELPMSG 2185.
What do I need to do to let the client pc start and stop this service remotely?
Edit: I mis-remembered the original commands. They were not using "net start" and "net stop" remotely. They were using
sc \\server_name start tomato
and
sc \\server_name stop tomato
And those commands to indeed still work.
Best Answer
the "net start/stop" commands can only start or stop services locally, on the same computer. You cannot use it to start or stop services running on another computer.
For this, you could use for instance psservice, part of the PsTools from Sysinternals. With the right parameters, you can control services on a remote computer, providing you have the correct credentials to do it.