close all windows programmes

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ian Hoare
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Ian Hoare

Salut/Hi Ken Blake,

le/on Sat, 22 Jan 2005 15:22:03 -0700, tu disais/you said:-
In


Mostly because they may need to replace a file that that an
application may have open--for example a newer version of a dll.
Click to expand...

Ah... makes sense. Thanks.
The usual advice is everything except Explorer and Systray (at
least in WIndows 98, and it was never necessary to keep Systray
open there, anyway). Actually, I rarely shut down anything at
all, despite the warnings, and never all the background programs.
The worst thing that can happen is that an installation will fail
to complete because something wasn't shut down. If that occurs
(and it hardly ever does), *then* I shut down everything and redo
the installation.
Click to expand...

So there's little risk of a half completed installation bollixing
everything, then. That's a relief.

Thanks very much Ken, and also to André.
 
ineed to close windows to install another programme. how
do i do this
Click to expand...

You do not need to close Windows, as in the operating system Windows XP. You
need to close all open windows, as in windows used by running programs. This
is easily done by clicking the 'X' symbol in the top right corner of your
windows.
 
Salut/Hi André Gulliksen,

le/on Sat, 22 Jan 2005 18:10:11 +0100, tu disais/you said:-
You do not need to close Windows, as in the operating system Windows XP. You
need to close all open windows, as in windows used by running programs. This
is easily done by clicking the 'X' symbol in the top right corner of your
windows.
Click to expand...

This is something that has often exercised my mind.

Intallation programs often (usually) warn you to close all open applications
before installing. I am curious as to why, and what this means exactly.

For example, it's obvious that if I've got Wordperfect and Eudora open, it
would be intelligent to close them down, but what about Kaspersky
anti-virus, Zonealarm, Zip Quickpick, PGP tray, Hamster, all of which are
sitting on my tray, and are either waiting for a "click", or else monitoring
what's going on. I remember reading some time ago (for Win 98) that it was
recommnded that I should go into Task manager and close down just about all
processes except Explorer and System (I think it was).

In XP things are more complex and after closing everything (except hamster)
that I can on the tray, my task manager at the moment shows the following
processes (some wouldn't be running if I weren't writing this!! - agent.exe
and hamster)

Applications.

agent.exe

Processes.

taskmgr.exe (open to show what's running)
agent.exe (open to write this message)
Hamster.exe (open to collect articles)
SVCHOST.EXE (SYSTEM) (?)
CTFMON.EXE (?)
ALG.EXE (?)
EXPLORER.EXE (obvious)
DMADMIN.EXE (I guess this handles Direct memory access)
SVCHOST (again?)
NVSVC32.EXE (Nvidia display)
SPOOLSV.EXE (Guess this handles spooling)
SVCHOST.EXE (LOCAL SERVICE) (I've no)
SVCHOST.EXE (NETWORK SERVICE) (idea)
SVCHOST.EXE (SYSTEM) (what these)
SVCHOST.EXE (NETWORK SERVICE) (all)
SVCHOST.EXE (SYSTEM) are doing)
LSASS.EXE (SYSTEM) (?)
SERVICES.EXE (SYSTEM) (?)
WINLOGON.EXE (SYSTEM) (presumably handles log on, needed later?)
CRSS.EXE (SYSTEM) (?)
sMSS.EXE (SYSTEM) (?)
RUNDLL32.EXE (Ian Hoare) presumably runs a DLL as a program)
wscntfy.exe (Ian Hoare) (there are copies of this all over the place,
and is a downloaded microsoft security service of some kind)
SYSTEM (obvious)
SYSTEM IDLE PROCESS (obvious)

Assuming I close the first three down, is it safe to leave ALL the rest
open before installing a program?

By the way, what's with all these SVCHOSTs? They are each taking between
1.3mb and 23 Mb, a total of 40 Mb before I _start using any applications.
 
In
Ian Hoare said:
This is something that has often exercised my mind.

Intallation programs often (usually) warn you to close all open
applications before installing. I am curious as to why, and
what this
means exactly.
Click to expand...


Mostly because they may need to replace a file that that an
application may have open--for example a newer version of a dll.

For example, it's obvious that if I've got Wordperfect and
Eudora
open, it would be intelligent to close them down, but what
about
Kaspersky anti-virus, Zonealarm, Zip Quickpick, PGP tray,
Hamster,
all of which are sitting on my tray, and are either waiting for
a
"click", or else monitoring what's going on. I remember reading
some
time ago (for Win 98) that it was recommnded that I should go
into
Task manager and close down just about all processes except
Explorer
and System (I think it was).
Click to expand...


The usual advice is everything except Explorer and Systray (at
least in WIndows 98, and it was never necessary to keep Systray
open there, anyway). Actually, I rarely shut down anything at
all, despite the warnings, and never all the background programs.
The worst thing that can happen is that an installation will fail
to complete because something wasn't shut down. If that occurs
(and it hardly ever does), *then* I shut down everything and redo
the installation.
 
Ian said:
Intallation programs often (usually) warn you to close all open
applications before installing. I am curious as to why, and what this
means exactly.
Click to expand...

Just in case. Most installlers ask you to shut down other programs to reduce
the risk of failures. Such failures can occure due to conflicts when the
installer tries to access a resource that is already in use by an active
program. But this rarely happens. I often find myself installing programs in
the background, while continuing my work in the foreground.

Also, some anti virus software will detect and prevent attempts to alter
certain system files. In these cases you will have to disable your AV to
complete installations which affects these system files.
By the way, what's with all these SVCHOSTs? They are each taking
between
1.3mb and 23 Mb, a total of 40 Mb before I _start using any
applications.
Click to expand...

These are usually host processes for various system services.
 
In
Ian Hoare said:
So there's little risk of a half completed installation
bollixing
everything, then. That's a relief.

Thanks very much Ken, and also to André.
Click to expand...


You're welcome, Ian. I hesitate to say it can never happen, and
suppose it might be possible that *some* half-completed
installations might cause a problem, but I've never run into one.
 
You don't need to close Windows itself - you install the new program from
within Windows.

But if you need to close applications such as IE, Outlook Express, Word etc,
then use each applications File > Exit command - is that what you mean? Or
right click the application button on the task bar and select "Close".

In the systray, right click the icons and click "Close", "exit" or "disable"
(whatever the option might be).

Go to Ctrl-Alt-Del and "end process" on background programs - but it might
be better to leave these alone if they're vital system functions.
 
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