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From: mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Spawning Windows Applications (The
Message-ID: <245400027@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: 23 Sep 89 15:15:00 GMT
References: <7768@microsoft.UUCP>
Lines: 61
Nf-ID: #R:microsoft.UUCP:7768:uxe.cso.uiuc.edu:245400027:000:2513
Nf-From: uxe.cso.uiuc.edu!mcdonald    Sep 23 10:15:00 1989


>/* ---------- "Spawning Windows Applications (The" ---------- */

>Ok, there has been enough posting back and forth about how to spawn a
>Windows application, and enough mis-information being stated that I
>decided I'd better 'bring out the horse' so you could get it straight
>from the source.

>Following this message will be the code that the Windows Development
>Support Team provides its customers on how to spawn applications in
>Windows. If you have an OnLine account, an archive of this information
>(includeing .OBJs and the .EXE) is available under the title of
>WINSPAWN.ARC in the software library.

>!!DO NOT EVER USE ANY OF THE 'spawn' FUNCTIONS FROM THE C RUNTIME LIBRARY!!

  >Execute your program, have it spawn Excel, then quit your program,
  >then quit Excel.

>There are conditions that will cause this to crash Windows. The reason
>being, that Excel (and some other non-MS applications) took for granted
>that they were being spawned by the MS-DOS Executive, which was
>'guaranteed' to be around longer then they were, and they were making
>use of the spawners stack to maintain some special data. If that stack
>disappears, then problems arise.

> __________________________________________________________________________
>     #####   ####### |	  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..."


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.


FLAME ON!!!

really now! Look at the Ansi standard for C. The spawn and exec
functions are in the standard. They are REQUIRED either to work
or to do nothing at all. When tried under Windows they most certainly
do something. If I write a program under Windows, which most
certainly claims to be multitasking (at least Windows 386),
I would spawn new programs using "spawn". I tried it - and 
it most certainly worked in every case I tried. If it breaks

**** IT IS NOT MY FAULT ****.

Microsoft should fix their bugs!!!!!!

Is there an OFFICIAL admission that Windows is brain-dead?

Does this same sick admission apply to OS/2? Is it brain-dead also?

Doug McDonald