Can an application delete itself?

[Peteroid]

Can a Managed C++ application delete its own .EXE file that spawned it? Or
is it 'open?

[==Peteroid==]

 

[William DePalo [MVP VC++]]

Can a Managed C++ application delete its own .EXE file that spawned it? Or
is it 'open?

The short answer is that it can not.

There is a hack floating around the net that makes use of some undocumented
stuff and on some platforms will delete the executable when it terminates.

The supported way to do this is to call MoveFileEx() with a null target file
name and the MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT option.

In case you don't know you can initiate a reboot with
InitiateSystemShutdown() or ExitWindowsEx().

Regards,
Will

 

[Peteroid]

Thanks!

The short answer is that it can not.

There is a hack floating around the net that makes use of some
undocumented stuff and on some platforms will delete the executable when
it terminates.

The supported way to do this is to call MoveFileEx() with a null target
file name and the MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT option.

In case you don't know you can initiate a reboot with
InitiateSystemShutdown() or ExitWindowsEx().

Regards,
Will