For the benefit of the group, I thought I'd share some experiences I had
when attempting to get
Stunnel to run under Windows 7 SP1 64-bit.
I initially installed Stunnel version 4.53 to the default location,
which in Windows 7 64-bit is:
C:\Program Files (x86)\stunnel\
I installed the service from the start menu option, then rebooted my
machine.
I have administrator rights, and User Account Control is disabled. My
observations
included the following:
1. The Stunnel status window displayed only configuration loads. No
output from any
active connection was ever displayed, despite the fact that
Stunnel was passing
traffic to/from SSL-enabled servers.
2. Stunnel would not write to the log file. The error message
indicated that Stunnel was
unable to open stunnel.log. Initially, I thought this might be a
factor in the lack of
status window connection output, so I commented the log statement
out to eliminate it.
I then reloaded the configuration. The issue of not seeing any
connection info
was unaffected.
3. The notification area icon would not appear on Stunnel service
load. It would mysteriously
appear, then disappear, at seemingly random times.
4. Once the service was installed, it was not possible to stop it or
uninstall it from the
provided start menu shortcuts. Whenever I attempted to do so,
the Stunnel status
window would appear. However, I was able to perform these
actions successfully by
opening a command prompt, then issuing the commands from there.
In an effort to unravel these issues, I tried the following workarounds:
1. I re-installed stunnel to a non-system controlled directory. In my
case, it was C:\Apps\stunnel\.
2. I attempted to run stunnel in compatibility mode, set for Windows
XP SP3.
3. I tried installing 2 previous versions of Stunnel.
All combinations produced exactly the same undesired result.
Finally, I stopped and uninstalled the service. Instead of using that
method, I created a
shortcut to stunnel.exe, and placed it in the start menu's startup
folder, then rebooted.
Stunnel started at boot time, and all of the above issues were resolved.
As such, it seems like Stunnel just doesn't like to be run as a service
on a Windows 7 64-bit
machine; at least not on the one I own.
If you're encountering any stability issues with the Stunnel service in
the Windows 7 64-bit
environment, try my method. It works.
I'd like to extend a special thank you to Carter Browne, who provided
valuable input throughout
the course of my testing.
Regards,
Thomas
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