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Q156484: Process Launched with CreateProcess() May Terminate Prematurely

Article: Q156484
Product(s): Microsoft Windows NT
Version(s): winnt:3.0,4.0
Operating System(s): 
Keyword(s): kbenv kbinterop
Last Modified: 10-AUG-2001

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The information in this article applies to:

- Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 4.0 
- Microsoft Windows NT Server version 4.0 
- Microsoft Internet Information Server 3.0 
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SYMPTOMS
========

Cmd.exe, Perl.exe, or other console-mode applications may fail to initialize
properly and terminate prematurely when launched by a service using the
CreateProcess() or CreateProcessAsUser() APIs. The calling process has no way of
knowing that the launched console-mode application has terminated prematurely.

In some instances, calling GetExitCode() against the failed process indicates the
following exit code:

  128L ERROR_WAIT_NO_CHILDREN - There are no child processes to wait for.

In multithreaded applications, the premature termination causes desktop heap
leaks. Over time the desktop heap is exhausted, which results in User32.dll or
Kernal32.dll initialization errors.

MORE INFORMATION
================

- Internet Information Server (IIS) may exhibit this problem intermittently
  when processing CGI or Perl scripts. In this case the browser returns the
  following error when executing CGI scripts:

  CGI Error

  The specified CGI application misbehaved by not returning a complete set of
  HTTP headers. The headers it did return are:.

- Remote Command Service (RCMD) may also exhibit this problem. RCMD clients
  experience connect and disconnect messages when they attempt to access a
  server running RCMD service. This may be used as a test application to see if
  another service is running into this problem.

- Other third-party services (such as Patrol from BMC Software) are also known
  to fail because of this problem.

RESOLUTION
==========

To resolve this problem, please see the following articles in the Microsoft
Knowledge Base for more information:

  ARTICLE-ID: Q142676
  TITLE : Overcoming User32.dll Initialization Failure Errors

  ARTICLE-ID: Q175687
  TITLE : Win32k.sys Causes STOP 0x0000001e and 0x0000000a On SMP


Additional query words:

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Keywords          : kbenv kbinterop 
Technology        : kbWinNTsearch kbWinNTWsearch kbWinNTW400 kbWinNTW400search kbWinNT400search kbWinNTSsearch kbWinNTS400search kbWinNTS400 kbiisSearch kbiis300
Version           : winnt:3.0,4.0
Issue type        : kbprb

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