force a program to close

I need to force a program to kill itself
I already have the way to get the handle of it, but from some reason the program will resist the

SC_CLOSE command.

is there any other way to kill it appart from rebooting the machine ???

You could send a WM_CLOSE message with postmessage api

Code:

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PostMessage appwnd&, WM_CLOSE, 0, 0

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I believe the CloseHandle API should work as well.

I will try both (I am in the proccess of trying the first..

Someone told me that nothing would work because this game is using DirectX drivers, so It will not "listen" to the commands from windows, is that true ???

if it is true, than I need to find a way to crash the application, how do you send ALL the windows commands in a loop (open,close,minimize,maximize ...) this might crash it eventually ? what is the range of numbers I should put in the loop (I don't want to crash the whole machine).

NOTHING absulutly NOTHING

this program really takes over ...

I will probably need to crash the whole machine before getting rid of it.

Any suggestions from anybody ??

You could try these, i haven't used them but they might be usefull

Code:

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Declare Function TerminateProcess Lib "kernel32" Alias "TerminateProcess" (ByVal hProcess As Long, ByVal uExitCode As Long) As Long
Declare Function GetWindowThreadProcessId Lib "user32" Alias "GetWindowThreadProcessId" (ByVal hwnd As Long, lpdwProcessId As Long) As Long
'I have never used these but

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Thanks, I will try

The only way I could kill it was with causing a blue screen, and than again, the program would still continue (all screwed up , but still running) it is like a giant that can't be killed..

The whole machine was totally screwed up, but this was going on ...

I just wrote a C++ program that would REALLY crash the machine (allocating endless memorry, never use it, and than allocating more ... 100000000 times)
so I will try this as well...


Again, I will try your code though.


thanks

" How can I close an application?"
You can use the FindWindow and PostMessage API functions to find a window and then close it. This example show how you can close down a Window with a caption of "Calculator".
Dim winHwnd As Long
Dim RetVal As Long
winHwnd = FindWindow(vbNullString, "Calculator")
Debug.Print winHwnd
If winHwnd <> 0 Then
RetVal = PostMessage(winHwnd, WM_CLOSE, 0&, 0&)
If RetVal = 0 Then
MsgBox "Error posting message."
End If
Else
MsgBox "The Calculator is not open."
End If
Before this,you have to declare the API functions in a module in your project.
Declarations : ( PostMessage and FindWindow )

Public Declare Function PostMessage Lib "user32" Alias "PostMessageA" (ByVal hWnd As Long, ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Long, ByVal lParam As Long) As Long

Public Declare Function FindWindow Lib "user32" Alias "FindWindowA" (ByVal lpClassName As String, ByVal lpWindowName As String) As Long

Good Luck Asabi.
Regards,Supera.

Well, the thing is that this program is using directX so it won't close with this command (I have tried), infact, I sent a command to shut off windows (the operating system), and this program was still running !, just when I quit this program THAN the whole thing would reboot.

I found my way ...
I found an EXE file that would crash the whole machine ..., that's the only way I could find.

Thank you

I need to know how to close a program that is runing?

How do I do this?

If possible can someone send me a demo of how the code works?

My E-Mail: [email protected]

any information is helpfull to me.... Thanks

~Joe

You can close an Already running App like this. Put the following code into a Module.

Code:

---

Declare Function FindWindow Lib "user32.dll" Alias "FindWindowA" (ByVal lpClassName As Any, ByVal lpWindowName As Any) As Long
Declare Function SendMessage Lib "user32" Alias "SendMessageA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Long, lParam As Any) As Long
Public Const WM_CLOSE = &H10

---

Now put this Code into a CommandButton

Code:

---

Private Sub Command1_Click()

    ' Get the Handle of Calculator
    chWnd = FindWindow(CLng(0), "Calculator")
    ' Send a Message to close it
    SendMessage chWnd, WM_CLOSE, CLng(0), CLng(0)

End Sub

---

This code will Close Calculator. Before you run the code, make sure that you have Calculator running. If you want, you can modify the code to suit yourself by replacing the "Calculator" with another Application's Title.

I personally like this way:

Code:

---

Const MAX_PATH& = 260
Declare Function TerminateProcess Lib "kernel32" (ByVal ApphProcess As Long, ByVal uExitCode As Long) As Long
Declare Function OpenProcess Lib "kernel32" (ByVal dwDesiredAccess As Long, ByVal blnheritHandle As Long, ByVal dwAppProcessId As Long) As Long
Declare Function ProcessFirst Lib "kernel32" Alias "Process32First" (ByVal hSnapshot As Long, uProcess As PROCESSENTRY32) As Long
Declare Function ProcessNext Lib "kernel32" Alias "Process32Next" (ByVal hSnapshot As Long, uProcess As PROCESSENTRY32) As Long
Declare Function CreateToolhelpSnapshot Lib "kernel32" Alias "CreateToolhelp32Snapshot" (ByVal lFlags As Long, lProcessID As Long) As Long
Declare Function CloseHandle Lib "kernel32" (ByVal hObject As Long) As Long

Type PROCESSENTRY32
    dwSize As Long
    cntUsage As Long
    th32ProcessID As Long
    th32DefaultHeapID As Long
    th32ModuleID As Long
    cntThreads As Long
    th32ParentProcessID As Long
    pcPriClassBase As Long
    dwFlags As Long
    szexeFile As String * MAX_PATH
    End Type

Public Function KillApp(myName As String) As Boolean
   
    Const PROCESS_ALL_ACCESS = 0
    Dim uProcess As PROCESSENTRY32
    Dim rProcessFound As Long
    Dim hSnapshot As Long
    Dim szExename As String
    Dim exitCode As Long
    Dim myProcess As Long
    Dim AppKill As Boolean
    Dim appCount As Integer
    Dim i As Integer
    On Local Error Goto Finish
    appCount = 0
   
    Const TH32CS_SNAPPROCESS As Long = 2&
   
    uProcess.dwSize = Len(uProcess)
    hSnapshot = CreateToolhelpSnapshot(TH32CS_SNAPPROCESS, 0&)
    rProcessFound = ProcessFirst(hSnapshot, uProcess)


    Do While rProcessFound
        i = InStr(1, uProcess.szexeFile, Chr(0))
        szExename = LCase$(Left$(uProcess.szexeFile, i - 1))


        If Right$(szExename, Len(myName)) = LCase$(myName) Then
            KillApp = True
            appCount = appCount + 1
            myProcess = OpenProcess(PROCESS_ALL_ACCESS, False, uProcess.th32ProcessID)
            AppKill = TerminateProcess(myProcess, exitCode)
            Call CloseHandle(myProcess)
        End If
        rProcessFound = ProcessNext(hSnapshot, uProcess)
    Loop
    Call CloseHandle(hSnapshot)
    Finish:
End Function

---

what is myName (in the call for the function)?


Is it the window caption ?

It is the EXE ("C:\myapp\app.exe").

If you would like an project sample instead. Here is the link: http://www.planet-source-code.com/vb...txtCodeId=4377

[Edited by Matthew Gates on 07-06-2000 at 06:16 PM]

You might try to use the DestroyWindow(TheThingYouWantToDestroy.hwnd)
API?

That closes the window but doesn't end the prog.

But what the hell do I know?

Well, I have already used Matthew Gates method, and it did work (everything else never worked) this program does not really work in a window, and it is using the direct X libarary so it doesn't really listens to the windows commands (even killing explorer just hanged the machine, but not this program.

Now it works though (with killing the proccess).


Thank you :-)