Apple Push Notifications on Windows Server 2008 not working

Question

I'm stuck and I hope somebody here will help me.

For a few days I'm trying to send apple push notifications from windows server 2008. But nothing is send or received. In fact, I've moved everything to simple mvc application so it can be debug easier and I've noticed that it hangs when I try to force sending the push notifications (on push.StopAllServices(true); ) They were working (and still are) from windows server 2012R2 with the same approach to send notifications so I guess the certificates and code are fine.

• I'm using windows service & push sharp to send notifications. target framework: 4
• The test project is MVC 2.0 target framework 4
• I've installed asp.net 4.5 on the server
• I've installed certificate via mmc in Personal (the private key is available, granted permission for IUSR and IIS_USRS) and Trusted Root Certificate Authorities.
• Port 2195 is open

Here's the code:

private void Initizalize()
        {
            push = new PushBroker();

            //appleCert is path to my .p12 certificate on disk.     
            var cert = new ApplePushChannelSettings(false, appleCert, "***");

            //I've read somewhere that it was helpful to force send notifications. Well, in my case it's not. 
            var settings = new PushServiceSettings();

            settings.AutoScaleChannels = false;
            settings.Channels = 3;
            settings.MaxAutoScaleChannels = 3;


            //Wire up the events for all the services that the broker registers
            push.OnNotificationSent += NotificationSent;
            push.OnChannelException += ChannelException;
            push.OnServiceException += ServiceException;
            push.OnNotificationFailed += NotificationFailed;
            push.OnDeviceSubscriptionExpired += DeviceSubscriptionExpired;
            push.OnDeviceSubscriptionChanged += DeviceSubscriptionChanged;
            push.OnChannelCreated += ChannelCreated;
            push.OnChannelDestroyed += ChannelDestroyed;

            push.RegisterAppleService(cert, settings);
        }

public void SendPush()
        {
            Initizalize();
            var token = hard coded token that exists;
            var output = "msg";
            push.QueueNotification(new AppleNotification()
                                       .ForDeviceToken(token)
                                       .WithAlert(output)
                                       .WithBadge(1)
                                       .WithSound("default"));

            push.StopAllServices(true);
        }

It raises event "OnNotificationSent", nothing else.

One more thing that may be important. Sending and receiving push notifications was and is working from windows server 2012 but it's windows azure virtual machine so installing the certificate was different.

Any ideas? Even the information that it cannot be done will be helpful!

edit: One problem solved:

Apparently you need to have reference to NewtonSoft.Json in order to call StopAllServices. It doesn't hang now but nothing is received by the device.

Answer 1

Looks like on Windows Server 2008 apns certificates private key must have granted permission for user that wants to use it.

As I wrote before I've granted it for IIS_USRS but that's only for applications running under IIS. And since I was using windows service it wasn't working. So what I did was check user for windows service (Services -> Log On As) and granted permission to certificates private key for this user.