Watin taking black Screenshots when RDP is disconnected

Question

We are using WatiN - 2.1.0 to take a screenshot when an test fails.when RDP is in disconnected mode on all screenshot's are recorded black(using IE9)

on Server we are running

windows server 2008 VM
internet explorer 9

The screenshots recorded on test failure are all black.

Answer 1

It is not possible to take screenshots of disconnected RDP sessions. RDP uses its own display driver, which doesn't pass draw commands if the session is in a disconnected state.

Instead you could keep the RDP connection open. To allow to minimize the RDP client you may add the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Terminal Server Client\

Add there a new DWORD named "RemoteDesktop_SuppressWhenMinimized" with the value "2".

Another solution is it to move the session to the console:

To prevent this, don't use the 'x' to close the remote connection, but use %windir%\\system32\\tscon.exe 0 /dest:console instead. (That will insure that the screen isn't locked). - Nicolas Voron

References:

• Terminal session when minimized\\disconnected returns a blank screen upon capturing desktop snapshot
• Capture screen on server desktop session