Can you execute any windows program?

I was just wondering if there is a way to execute any program installed on your computer (or shortcut to a program), using Visual C++ (with MFC).

I want to be able to execute a shortcut because some shortcuts allow extra parameters to be included. For instance I have a short cut to Half Life (a game) that starts up a map ('level') that I made, instead of loading the regular game.


Ok thanks.

maybe you can use the system command...

system("C:\\GAMES\\HALFLIFE\\HALFLIFE.EXE");

You want to look into the system() or spawn() commands I think. I don't know of anything that will actually let you execute another shortcut, those commands can be used to execute a program directly; you'd need to give them details of the parameters you want to pass. Something like the following should work.

Code:

---

#include <stdlib.h>

int main (void)
{

system ("c:\sierra\halflife\hl.exe -game cstrike");
return (EXIT_SUCCESS);

}

---

Alright I shall try these things out, thanks for replying to my post. I will tell you how things go, or anything I find interesting.

How come using only single slashes doesn't work?
Using two is dumb :(

Either \\ or / is acceptable.

I once wrote a function that parsed shortcut's for their target filename. It wasn't that difficult either. Tip: read the shortcut into an array and study the numerical values of the bytes. I can't remember now, but I think that the byte preceding the target name was a numerical 10 or 16....