roberth@microsoft.UUCP (Robert Hess) (09/26/89)
Doug McDonald (mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu) quoted my previous posting on spawning applications in Windows, and somehow came to the conclusion: > Very odd. Very odd indeed!!!!!! > > An admission from an employee of Microsoft Corporation that their > products - Microsoft C, Microsoft Windows, and Microsoft Excel - > are DEFECTIVE. Looking through my original message, I said nothing of the sort. The only points that might be misinterpreted to be this were the statements: 1. Do not use any of the 'spawn' functions from the C RunTime 2. Under certain circumstances Excel (and other applications) will crash Windows if spawned from an application that exits before the spawned application does. (this DOES NOT apply to only MS products) Neither of these statements imply that anything is defective... mearly that there is a right way, and a wrong way to do things. In order for Windows to run multiple applications simulataniously, there are a few caveats. The 'spawn' functions in the C RunTime were designed for generic application development. They do not include the neccessary code to properly do Windows style spawning (which would not be appropriate to be included in a generic application). So far, we have found that the sample code we distribute (and that I posted) is quite adequate in handling the needs of our developers. As for Excel being 'defective' - Sure, it has some bugs in it, what program doesn't? But the problem it has with being spawned by another application that happens to go away, isn't a defect, it is a design. I do not know the exact reason why it is doing this, but (at the time) it was intentional for maintaining some sort of information. Since it has so far been rare that other applications will spawn Excel then exit, this has not proven to be a problem. Doug, If you will look at my signature, I state quite plainly: "...my opinions are strictly my own, and not those of my employer..." I am posting to this net not because anybody asks me to (in fact, I no longer work with Windows), but because I want to help any programmers out there that I can. Not everybody can afford the $800 it takes to be on our OnLine service. I already am trying to be careful about what I say, if I find that I have to pass my postings through our legal department first, I assure you that I will stop watching this area. If you have some sort of hostility built up towards Microsoft, please do not vent it towards those of us here that are taking our own time to help you out. -Robert __________________________________________________________________________ ##### ####### | Robert B. Hess, Microsoft Corp., Redmond, WA ###### ####### |----------------------------------------------------- ####### ####### | roberth@microsof.uu.net #### ##### #### | {decvax, uunet, uw-beaver}!microsof!roberth #### ### #### |_____________________________________________________ ************************************************************************** ************************************************************************** ************************************************************************** *** *** "...my opinions are strictly my own, and not those of my employer..." *** *** ************************************************************************** ************************************************************************** **************************************************************************
paul@cscnj.csc.COM (Paul Moody) (09/27/89)
I would like to thank Bob for providing those of us fighting the windows battles with his information. We need all of the help we can get. -- Paul Moody UUCP: rutgers!cscnj!paul Computer Sciences Corporation # the opinions expressed are entirely imaginary #