Task Scheduler error

[Rick]

A long time ago I scheduled a task to load up a certain
utility at 7 am. However, I've just realized it never
gets loaded. I went into Task Scheduler to see what's
going on, and as it opened I get this error:

"An error has occured for task Reminders - owner. Error
message: the specified account name is not valid"

I'm looking at my task and I see that "When running a
task, use the following user account" is set to "RICK
\owner". I'm not sure how to check if that's a valid
account name. I don't log on to my computer with a
username or password. Thanks for any help.

 

[Rick]

Thanks. I'm making sure to load Task Scheduler as
Administrator. I created a new task to load my small
program using user name SYSTEM but it still fails. In
the log I see "Action failed to start".

I see other tasks with user name 'owner' have worked but
I can't figure out how to enter that as the account
name. If I click on 'Change Owner or Group' and enter
'owner' it comes back as RICK\owner since it's starting
at location 'RICK'.

Not sure how to just enter my account name which I guess
is RICK. 'Adminstrator' and 'administors' are not
valid.

Any help would be appreciated!



(e-mail address removed)>,
(e-mail address removed) says...

 

[Rick]

Great; thanks, I now have this one task working.

But I'm still getting that original error message
whenever I click on Task Scheduler (Local): "An error
has occured for task Reminders - owner. Error
message: the specified account name is not valid"

I'm guessing it must be from tasks already in there.
Out of 10 tasks already there three of them use account
'owner-PC\owner'. I'm guessing that's not a valid
account name on my machine. Maybe the root was 'owner-
PC' when I first got the machine, and then I must have
changed the root location from 'owner-PC' to 'RICK'.
This is probably a task left over from before I changed
it?

Should I try disabling those tasks?

 

[Rick]

Nah, there are seven tasks that load PCALUA.EXE with
various arguments. OK, I just deleted the three that
use account name 'owner-PC\owner' and I thought
everything was fixed. But still every time I open Task
Scheduler and then click on Task Scheduler (Local) on
the left I still get that error message.

I wonder what it's referring to with "task Reminders -
owner". I don't see any task with that name.

(e-mail address removed)>, (e-mail address removed)
says...

 

[Rick]

(e-mail address removed)>, (e-mail address removed)
says...

Have you Googled the error text ?
It seems to be something to do with Windows Calendar.
Here's a couple I found:
http://www.vistax64.com/vista-general/73934-phantom-task-windows-calendar.html
http://www.vistax64.com/vista-general/126557-task-scheduler-anyone.html

THANK YOU! I found the answer in one of those posts.
The task "Reminders - owner" was some sort of ghost
task: it didn't show in the WindowsCalendar folder even
if I turned on "View Hidden Tasks". I had to go into
Windows Explorer and look into the directory and there
was a file by that name. I deleted the file and now I'm
fine. I guess since its account name was invalid, it
wouldn't show up in TS even though its presence was
enough to generate an error.

Now I have to figure out why instances of my new task
running in the last two days don't show up in the
History tab. But for now, I'm celebrating my victory.
Your help was much appreciated.

 

[Rick]

Well done.
On a different topic, why does your newsreader delete
the poster's name from the headers when you reply?

I'm using an ancient newsreader called Gravity. Did it
do it this time?

P.S. Is bottom-posting the general preference here?

P.P.S. After I click my SEND command, Gravity asks me
"Some lines in this message are longer than 80
characters and may be hard to read on some displays. Do
you want to continue sending? Yes/No." Rather than
deleting any of the text of the previous posts, I am
saying YES as I believe I have done each time. Let's
see what happens...