Active sessions can have no related clients
Article ID: 187049
Article Last Modified on 11/1/2006
APPLIES TO
- Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0, Terminal Server Edition
This article was previously published under Q187049
SYMPTOMS
To open active sessions without clients connected to them: Start as many
connections you want, and do nothing in your connections (no clock in
taskbar). Minimize all your clients and switch off your client computer (to
simulate a power outage). Now, restart your client computer. All of your
lost connections will be reported as active by Terminal Server.
This behavior is also observed when the Win16 client stops responding
(hangs) in stress. The connection is no longer active. Yet, the server does
not detect the loss of the connection. The session remains active and,
thereby, does not allow a reconnect.
CAUSE
Expected behavior is that the session should change from an active to a
disconnected status when the server no longer receives acknowledgement of
packet receipt from the client. With the NetBEUI or IPX/SPX protocols,
there are watchdog packets that get sent periodically. When these fail,
they will mark the session as disconnected. TCP has a similar concept
(KeepAlive packets). However, these are not used for several reasons. This
includes the fact that the connection may be across a WAN link which may or
may not always be up. In fact, in the case of a WAN link that is brought up
on demand use of the KeepAlive packets might cause the link to be brought
up and down when it is not really needed.
STATUS
This behavior is by design.
Keywords: kbbug kbnofix KB187049