Problem opening applications

[Garry Wall]

Lately,I'm finding that some applications sometimes won't open but they
appear in Task Manager as running processes. For example, sometimes
Spider will open fine, other times it doesn't. When it doesn't, it appears
as a running process but not as a running application. There doesn't seem
to be a pattern as to which applications or when.

 

[Guest]

I'm having the same problem with other applications too. IE and
Media Player don't appear, but are visible in the task manager.
I am also looking for an answer. There is a utility called Windows
debugging tool (link :
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtools/debugging/installx86.mspx)
I think I'll try it on one of those applications, and see if I can get more
information. There is another utility (Winspector.exe) that can
intercept windows messages to the application. That may also give
some more information.

 

[Guest]

Are you by any chance using IconPackager ? It is part of a set of programs
to change the layout and style of XP (or Windows OS). I found what the
problem (for me anyway) was. An error in the dll iprepair.dll (version 3.00a),
which caused this. Uninstalling the application - according to the mailing
lists
at StarDock, would not help. But since I upgraded to the next IconPackager
(v 3.00b - or something), no more false starts. And I wasn't even using
Iconpackager.
Hope this helps...

Henk Z