Diferentiate between regular window and background task

[poo706]

I've noticed with versions of Word and Excel (verified with 2000 and 2003) that sometimes after you shut down Word or Excel, it will continue running in the background. Sometimes with Word especially, it'll consume 100% of the CPU and drag the system to a halt. Hitting Ctrl-Alt-Del and ending the process fixes the problem.

So I was trying to write a script that would run Word and wait until it's been closed by the user. Then I want it check to make sure there are no Word windows open (in case I have multiple .doc's open), and end the script if any Word window is open. If no Word window is open, I want it to check and see if there are any winword.exe processes running in the background, and then end the process if true. Problem is, I can't seem to get AutoIt3 to be able to tell the difference between an open window and a running process. I have experimented with WinGetState, WinActive, WinExists, and a few others, but they all seem to recognize the background process as an open window.

Anyone have any experience with situations like this?

[poo]

[Paulie]

Something like this?

Opt('WintitleMatchMode',2) ;match any string in the title

While 1
Sleep(100)
If Not WinExists("- Microsoft Word") And ProcessExists("winword.exe") then ProcessClose("winword.exe")
WEnd

[poo706]

That's a bit fancier than the things I was trying, but more or less the same, just split up in different steps. I will give that a try. Problem is, to truly test this out I need Word or Excel to screw up and stay running, which doesn't happen all the time, and I can't seem to figure out what causes it to begin with. I saw it happen on a friend's computer too, so it's not just mine. Thanks for the help!

[poo]