After Serial Logger Service has been installed and configured, the service can be started. The service can be started using the Serial Logger Service Configuration program, the Windows Services applet in the Control Panel, or any other service control program. If the Start automatically when Windows starts checkbox is checked, then the service will startup automatically with Windows.
The Serial Logger Service Configuration program does not need to be running in order for the actual services to run, as they run in the background.
Any warnings, errors, timeouts, or other significant events will be recorded in the Windows Application Event Log which can be viewed by using Event Viewer.
While the service is running, any data received on the serial port will be immediately written to the log file. If the Timestamps option is set to No, the exact binary data received on the serial port will be copied to the log file. Serial Logger Service will not add any timestamps, carriage-returns, line-feeds, or modify the data in any way when it is written to the log file in this mode.
When the service starts, it does not overwrite the log file if it exists. Instead, it just appends newly received data to the end of the log file. If you want to start with a blank file, you must ensure that the log file doesn't exist or is blank before starting the service.
As long as the service is running, the log file is locked so that no other application can modify it. However, if the service is paused, the log file is closed so that other applications can read, write, move, or delete it. When the service is resumed, the log file is reopened (or recreated if necessary) and any data received on the serial port while the service was paused is written to the new log file. This mechanism allows for a very flexible method for importing the data into a database or another application without risking losing data during the import process. Pausing the service has no effect on ODBC logging.