Open default external Program with VB for file playback 1

[pdecker]

Hi,

I want to be able to open an external program with VB and send it a file. I know that the shell command works, but I want to do something more along the lines of having the user double click a file in a FileList and then the default application installed on the users machine for opening the file type that was clicked on will open and run it.

So if some one double clicks movie.avi , and media player is the default program for .avi files, it will open and play movie.avi....but if real player is the default, then real player will open and play movie.avi

Im somewhat new with VB so please be gentle, and generous, with code examples. Thanks for any help!

 

[ca8msm]

Try using the shellexecute command...

Private Declare Function ShellExecute Lib "shell32.dll" Alias "ShellExecuteA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, ByVal lpOperation As String, ByVal lpFile As String, ByVal lpParameters As String, ByVal lpDirectory As String, ByVal nShowCmd As Long) As Long
Const SW_SHOWNORMAL = 1
Private Sub Form_Load()
    'KPD-Team 1998
    'URL: [URL unfurl="true"]http://www.allapi.net/[/URL]
    'E-Mail: KPDTeam@Allapi.net
    'Send an E-Mail to the KPD-Team
    ShellExecute Me.hwnd, vbNullString, "mailto:KPDTeam@Allapi.net", vbNullString, "C:\", SW_SHOWNORMAL
End Sub

You can pass it a filename rather than the email address and it will use the defualt program to open it. See

http://www.mentalis.org/apilist/ShellExecute.shtml

for more information.

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[pdecker]

Thanks!! That was simple!