How to start one program from another

[chrisbrown]

ps is a command-line program, not a Turing keyword; it won't help you here.

While your launcher can't talk directly to a process that it spawns, you could modify those programs to be launched to write a new file on startup and delete on completion.

Then have your launcher continuously check for the existence of that file. If it exists, another program is running, so the launcher should become/stay hidden. Otherwise, a program has either finished or nothing has been launched, so the launcher should be visible.

[Tony]

Of course, should the program end unexpectedly via exceptions, it might not have a chance to write about its exit status. The only system that knows about the status of a process for a fact is the kernel.

[chrisbrown]

True. Windows' 'tasklist' program will display running processes, but even with a batch file and output redirection, I can't figure out a way to stop the command prompt from opening momentarily while it executes, so I don't think that's going to work for OP.

Without decent CLI integration, the heartbeat method is probably the best way to go. I think it was discussed somewhere recently.

[mirhagk]

How about have both programs connect to each other on the loop back address, I forget the syntax to write this exactly (almost 2 years since I really worked with Turing other than simple operations).

If the host program calls the new program, and the new program connects to the host program on the loopback address, then you can have both programs communicate to each other, being able to not only tell about whether the file is open or not, but also be able to send commands back and forth, for instance closing the child program from within the main program.

I am going to fool around a bit with the network part of turing, I'll be back in 5-10 minutes with some code that should work.

[mirhagk]

So I believe this code should work (my turing doesn't compile programs right, stupid 4.1.1)

Here's the main program

Turing:

put "starting program.exe" %obviosuly your code would go before here var address : string %used to store the address of the connecting computer if (Sys.Exec ("program.exe") = false) then %start the file     put "program could not be found" %if it doesnt start tell the user else     put "waiting for program to connect to main"     var client := Net.WaitForConnection (9000, address) %wait for a connection     put "connected, checking to make sure that the program is connected still" %now the program is connected     var timeSinceLast := 0 %the amount of time that's passed since last msg was recieved     var msg : char %to store the recieved message     loop         if (Net.CharAvailable (client)) then %if there is anything to read             get : client, msg %get it from the client             timeSinceLast := 0 %reset timer             put msg .. %display the one character         else             timeSinceLast += 1 %if nothing to read add to the timer         end if         exit when timeSinceLast > 1000 %if the timer is above 1000 (1 second)         %the program has "timed out" so we know it has ended         delay(1) %delay by a millesecond     end loop end if

and the program (you need to compile it first)

Turing:

put "started, connecting to host" var host := Net.OpenConnection ("127.0.0.0", 9000) %connect to host and store the connection in an int put "connected, transmitting welcome message" %now it's connected loop     put : host, "hi" %write to the host that it's still connected     exit when hasch () %exit when you press any key     delay (5) %delay by 5 milliseconds (just so the byte stream doesn't get to full end loop

[Cezna]

@ mirhagk
I'm not sure exactly what that will do, but it looks to me like you are just writing the client program into the launcher's run window.

[mirhagk]

No it runs the client, and the client just says hi until it ends, then it times out on the hosts side, letting you know when it's done