close running word/excel/outlook applications
 

Hi

I have to make sure that there is no Word, Excel or Outlook Application running, before I start my Installation/Uninstallation because I have created a COM Addin with .Net for Excel and Word.

At the moment I use FindWindow to get the Handle to the Application Window and then I use GetLastActivePopup to get a handle to a dialog that could be open (e.g. Options) and close it with sendmessage (WM_CLOSE).

However when I try to close the Mainwindow with Sendmessage - and some changes to the document has been made - I get the "Do you want save changes?" Dialog.
Unfortunately this Messagebox is blocking my Installer so I can not close this Dialog too.

Can somebody help me how to avoid this?

I also tried WM_DESTROY with sendmessage but Excel is crashing when I use this.

Or shall I kill the Process?
If yes, what functions do I have to use?

Best regards,
Melvin

You can do what the Winamp installer does. If Winamp is open, it warns you and lets you ignore the warning, retry or abort. I think this is the best solution. It is surely better than killing the process. I know I'd be very pissed if an installer discards an unsaved document of mine without even asking.

That is what I will do in nonsilent mode, but I am not sure if it is a good behaviour for silentmode...

0xE103 or 0xE10A command IDs for WM_COMMAND may help to save current changes (default RO IDs I see in MFC project), but I'am not sure this is good way - might be better to ask user first.
Edit
Finally you can try to emulate Ctrl-S using WM_KEYDOWN and others, for example http://www.cracklab*****pro/faq.php?pg=3106

For silent mode, I think it'd be best if you just abort. You can set a special return value using SetErrorLevel. You can also add a command line switch, maybe /FORCE, to enable the process killing.

Ok, I will do it this way.
Thanks a lot for your help :)