windows service vs scheduled tasks

Question

So this is my first stint with programmatically creating windows service or scheduled tasks and I am confused which one to choose. I had a look at various articles like http://weblogs.asp.net/jgalloway/archive/2005/10/24/428303.aspx , scheduled task or windows service and some more but can' t really decide btween the two

Here is my scenario :

My application will pick up the code paths of a few dlls from the db , execute the DLLs using MSTest.exe and log back the results to the Db. this will probably be repeated every 2-3 hours . Now I am leaning a bit towards scheduled tasks since i won't have to worry about memory related issues but need some expert advice on this.

P.S. : The DLLs contain test methods that make calls to web services of applications deployed on various servers

Thanks in advance for the help

Answer 1

A Scheduled Task would be more appropiate for your scenario. I don't think it make a lot of sense building a scheduling mechanism on a windows service when OS already provides scheduling infraestructure.

A Windows service is more appropiate for processes that have to respond to events at any moment and not at specific and fix periods. That's why they are running all the time. An example of this is the SQL Server Service.

An exception of this could be a task that needs to run every second or so. In that corner case, a Window Service could be the best solution. For your specific schedule, I have no doubts that a scheduled task would fit much more better.