send a message to another user-rather simple

[rsmall]

I want to be able to send a message to another computer on the network the way that you can with using the NET.EXE at the command line as in the format:

net send "<user>" "<message>"


I have the both the username and message in variables. Can someone help me with this?


Thanks,

Ryan Small

[Matthew Gates]

Try both of these ways:

Shell "net send " & user & Chr$(32) & message

Or:

Shell "command.com /c net send " & user & Chr$(32) & message

[matbrophy]

is there away of executing dos commands without the dos window appearing?

[Matthew Gates]

You can hide the window.

Shell "net send " & user & Chr$(32) & message, 0 'or vbHide

[SjR]

Does any one no if its possible to send a message to a computer that has the messenger service disabled (temporarily enable and then disable afterwards?) BTW, Logon scripts is not an option.
Thanks

[Frans C]

To send a network message using visual basic code, use the netMessageBufferSend api.

In a .bas module:

Private Declare Function NetMessageBufferSend Lib "netapi32" (ByVal ServerName As String, ByVal msgname As String, ByVal fromname As String, ByVal msgbuf As String, ByRef msgbuflen As Long) As Long
Private Const ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED As Long = 5
Private Const ERROR_BAD_NETPATH As Long = 53
Private Const ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER As Long = 87
Private Const ERROR_NOT_SUPPORTED As Long = 50
Private Const ERROR_INVALID_NAME As Long = 123
Private Const NERR_BASE As Long = 2100
Private Const NERR_Success As Long = 0                'success
Private Const NERR_NetworkError As Long = (NERR_BASE + 36)   'general network error occurred.
Private Const NERR_NameNotFound As Long = (NERR_BASE + 173)  'message alias could not be found on the network.
Private Const NERR_UseNotFound As Long = (NERR_BASE + 150)   'network connection could not be found.


Public Function NetSendMessage(ByVal sMessage As String, ByVal sTo As String, ByRef errMessage As String, Optional sFrom As String, Optional Server As String) As Boolean
Dim retVal As Long
    If Len(Trim(sTo)) > 0 Then
        sTo = StrConv(sTo, vbUnicode)
        If Len(sMessage) = 0 Then
            sMessage = vbNullString
        Else
            sMessage = StrConv(sMessage, vbUnicode)
        End If
        If Len(sFrom) = 0 Then
            sFrom = vbNullString
        Else
            sFrom = StrConv(sFrom, vbUnicode)
        End If
        If Len(Server) = 0 Then
            Server = vbNullString
        Else
            Server = StrConv(Server, vbUnicode)
        End If
        retVal = NetMessageBufferSend(Server, sTo, sFrom, sMessage, ByVal Len(sMessage))
        NetSendMessage = retVal = 0
        Select Case retVal
            Case ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED
                errMessage = "Access denied"
            Case ERROR_BAD_NETPATH
                errMessage = "Bad network path"
            Case ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER
                errMessage = "Invalid parameter"
            Case ERROR_NOT_SUPPORTED
                errMessage = "not supported"
            Case ERROR_INVALID_NAME
                errMessage = "Invalid name"
            Case NERR_NetworkError
                errMessage = "General network error"
            Case NERR_NameNotFound
                errMessage = "Message alias could not be found on the network."
            Case NERR_UseNotFound
                errMessage = "Network connection could not be found."
            Case NERR_Success
                errMessage = "Operation succeeded"
            Case Else
                errMessage = "Unknown error"
        End Select
    Else
        NetSendMessage = False
        errMessage = "No recipient selected"
    End If
End Function

To receive the message, the recipient needs to run a messenger service. A messenger service is basically not more then a program that periodically checks the messenger mailslot "\\.\mailslot\messngr" for files, and displays the contents of the file in a messagebox.