I use INF to create the service (but I guess you can use sc.exe also to create it) If hfslip uses a OCEntry to AddReg, CopyFiles and stuff you can also AddService to the same Optional Components Section and have the service created...so when hfslip detects the hotfix it can add a couple more lines to the inf to create the service like: [Optional Components] OCEntryName [OCEntryName] OptionDesc=... Tip=... Modes=0,1,2,3 CopyFiles=... AddReg=... AddService=WSearch,0x00000010,WSearch_Install [WSearch_Install] DisplayName=Windows Search Description="Provides content indexing and property caching for file, email and other content (via extensibility APIs). The service responds to file and email notifications to index modified content. If the service is stopped or disabled, the Explorer will not be able to display virtual folder views of items, and search in the Explorer will fall back to item-by-item slow search." ServiceType=0x10 StartType=0x2 ErrorControl=0x01 ServiceBinary=%11%\SearchIndexer.exe /Embedding StartName="LocalSystem" Dependencies=TermService AddReg=WSearch_Registry [WSearch_Registry] HKR,,"FailureActions",0x1,80,51,01,00,01,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,03,00,00,00,6e,00,64,00,01,00,00,00,30,75,00,00,01,00, 00,00,30,75,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00 The service DisplayName and Description may differ from language to language so you may want to check that out