API CreateProcess

I am using the Api Function CreateProcess but I have no Idea what to do with the "lpEnvironment As Any" Value

the simple version of this code is as follows:

Option Explicit

Private Const NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS As Long = &H20


Private Type PROCESS_INFORMATION
hProcess As Long
hThread As Long
dwProcessId As Long
dwThreadId As Long
End Type

Private Type STARTUPINFO
cb As Long
lpReserved As Long
lpDesktop As Long
lpTitle As Long
dwX As Long
dwY As Long
dwXSize As Long
dwYSize As Long
dwXCountChars As Long
dwYCountChars As Long
dwFillAttribute As Long
dwFlags As Long
wShowWindow As Integer
cbReserved2 As Integer
lpReserved2 As Byte
hStdInput As Long
hStdOutput As Long
hStdError As Long
End Type

Private Type SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES
nLength As Long
lpSecurityDescriptor As Long
bInheritHandle As Long
End Type

Private Declare Function CreateProcess Lib "kernel32.dll" Alias "CreateProcessA" (ByVal lpApplicationName As String, ByVal lpCommandLine As String, lpProcessAttributes As SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES, lpThreadAttributes As SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES, ByVal bInheritHandles As Long, ByVal dwCreationFlags As Long, lpEnvironment As Any, ByVal lpCurrentDriectory As String, lpStartupInfo As STARTUPINFO, lpProcessInformation As PROCESS_INFORMATION) As Long

Sub Main()
Dim spud As Long
Dim SNfo As STARTUPINFO
Dim PNfo As PROCESS_INFORMATION
Dim SAtt As SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES

With SNfo
.cb = 1753357
' .cbReserved2 = Null
' .dwFillAttribute
' .dwFlags
.dwX = 100
' .dwXCountChars
.dwXSize = 100
.dwY = 100
' .dwYCountChars
.dwYSize = 100
' .hStdError
' .hStdInput
' .hStdOutput
' .lpDesktop = Null
' .lpReserved = Null
' .lpReserved2 = Null
.lpTitle = 1
.wShowWindow = 1
End With

With SAtt
.bInheritHandle = 1753357
.lpSecurityDescriptor = 1
.nLength = False
End With

spud = CreateProcess(vbNullString, "c:\one", SAtt, SAtt, False, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS, 0, vbNullString, SNfo, PNfo)

Debug.Print spud
Debug.Print PNfo.hProcess
Debug.Print PNfo.dwProcessId
Debug.Print PNfo.dwThreadId
Debug.Print PNfo.hThread

End Sub





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in the line spud = CreateProcess(vbNullString, "c:\one", SAtt, SAtt, False, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS, 0, vbNullString, SNfo, PNfo)

I set the value to 0, I have also tried Null (the default in c++) but that does not work eather....


HELP!?!

The App I'm working with is connected to vendor hardware through a vendor dll driver that needs restarting at the app level sometimes. How can a VB App restart itself? Can I use CreateProcess(....) followed immediately and lastly by a call to ExitProcess(...)?

Can this technique be used in general for App1 to start App2 and then die?

Possibly this page can help explain CreateProcess().

As far as your question Dan, I do not believe so. CreateProcess is used to open a process that you want to wait until it has finished before your application gains control again. You would probably want to check out ShellExecute() which there is a link to that in the link listed above.

THX