Whilst looking at another issue I noticed that Windows 10 1809 has a number of services that randomly rename themselves after each reboot… by changing the name of the service by appending an underscore then 5 random characters (letters and/or numbers).
Checking further, it appears that Task Manager shows both the services with and without their random 5-character append whilst the Services.msc snap-in only shows the services with their random 5-character append.
Task Manager shows both services sorted (by default) by Name… which is actually the Service Name whilst the Services.msc snap-in shows just the one service by Name… which is actually the Display Name. Both include descriptions of each service… but they’re different:
Click to enlarge
The randomly-named services in question (by Display Name) are (at the moment):
-
[*]Bluetooth User Support Service
[*]CaptureService
[*]Clipboard User Service
[*]Connected Devices Platform Service*
[*]ConsentUX
[*]Contact Data
[*]DevicePicker
[*]DevicesFlow
[*]GameDVR and Broadcast User Service
[*]MessagingService
[*]PrintWorkflow
[*]Sync Host
[*]User Data Access
[*]User Data Storage
[*]Windows Push Notifications User Service
* This is (currently) the only service that shows both the non-randomised and randomly-named service of the same base name in Task Manager.
I wonder if it’s Microsoft trying to make it more difficult for end-users to ‘fiddle’ with services by randomly changing the names of the services?
Anyone else with an idea why this change of behaviour?