problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

[Dieter Wilhelm]

Hi

I'd like to be able to open a windows (on XP) compiled help file
(.chm).  It works well with `shell-process' in just giving the shell
the .chm file as argument.  But I can't get it to run with
start-process.  Probably I need to call a viewer for this file.  I
googled around and found that the internet explorer is supposed to act
as "viewer" for these help files.  The next hurdle is where to find
the executable, I can't find iexplorer.exe or iexplore.exe on my disk.

Thanks
-- 
    Best wishes

    H. Dieter Wilhelm
    Darmstadt, Germany

Re: problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

[Mathias Dahl]

Dieter Wilhelm <dieter@duenenhof-wilhelm.de> writes:

> I'd like to be able to open a windows (on XP) compiled help file
> (.chm).  It works well with `shell-process' in just giving the shell
> the .chm file as argument.  But I can't get it to run with
> start-process.  Probably I need to call a viewer for this file.  I
> googled around and found that the internet explorer is supposed to
> act as "viewer" for these help files.  The next hurdle is where to
> find the executable, I can't find iexplorer.exe or iexplore.exe on
> my disk.

Have you tried using `w32-shell-execute'?

(w32-shell-execute "Open" "blabla.chm")

/Mathias

Re: problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

[Dieter Wilhelm]

Mathias Dahl <brakjoller@gmail.com> writes:

> Dieter Wilhelm <dieter@duenenhof-wilhelm.de> writes:
>
>> I'd like to be able to open a windows (on XP) compiled help file
>> (.chm).  It works well with `shell-process' in just giving the shell
>> the .chm file as argument.  But I can't get it to run with
>> start-process.  Probably I need to call a viewer for this file.  I
>> googled around and found that the internet explorer is supposed to
>> act as "viewer" for these help files.  The next hurdle is where to
>> find the executable, I can't find iexplorer.exe or iexplore.exe on
>> my disk.
>
> Have you tried using `w32-shell-execute'?
>
> (w32-shell-execute "Open" "blabla.chm")

Exactly what I needed, works perfect, thank you.

Sad that these functions are not mentioned in the Emacs manual for
(emacs)Windows Processes.  I'm coding mostly under Linux and the w32-*
functions are not available when trying `describe-function'.

-- 
    Best wishes

    H. Dieter Wilhelm
    Darmstadt, Germany

Re: problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

[Lennart Borgman]

Dieter Wilhelm wrote:

>> Have you tried using `w32-shell-execute'?
>>
>> (w32-shell-execute "Open" "blabla.chm")
> 
> Exactly what I needed, works perfect, thank you.
> 
> Sad that these functions are not mentioned in the Emacs manual for
> (emacs)Windows Processes.  I'm coding mostly under Linux and the w32-*
> functions are not available when trying `describe-function'.


That is because no one has had the time to rewrite that part.

Reading that part I also found that it is about running DOS processes on 
MS Windows. I suggest that we rename to to reflect this.

Re: problems starting windows compiled help files with start-process

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 02:29:43 +0100
> From: Lennart Borgman <lennart.borgman.073@student.lu.se>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, Emacs Devel <emacs-devel@gnu.org>,
> 	Mathias Dahl <brakjoller@gmail.com>
> 
> That is because no one has had the time to rewrite that part.
> 
> Reading that part I also found that it is about running DOS processes on 
> MS Windows. I suggest that we rename to to reflect this.

What version of which manual are you reading?  In the CVS version (and
the one distributed with the pretest), the MS-Windows part _was_
rewritten, and the node's name is "Windows processes".