trail of the light
the truth is out there

Over the time of using Windows You might encounter apps which sometimes stop reacting to anything - or even worse: they stop reacting pretty often. There are many things which may be the source of the issue - but You might rather prefer to simply use the app instead of carefully investigate what causes the problem. The standard way to manage such cases comes down to using Task Manager (Ctrl+Shift+Esc) to find and stop the app which is not responding. Alternatively You can use myProcesses which is more convenient to use than the standard Task Manager - but there is even quicker way to address the matter. It is dedicated to cases which occur disturbingly often, therefore it would be great to have some ‘magic wand’ at hand, which could instantaneously fix the issue. In my experience (Windows 7 32-bit) the apps with tendency to freeze themselves are:

• Kodi,
• The Bat!,
• Connectify,
• LibreOffice;

Now, there is a simple method to handle this: You can create a dedicated ‘magic wand’ for each misbehaving app. This is how You can do that.

1. Find out how does the app’s process is named - and where it is located. A process name You can find using Windows Task Manager mentioned before - on the Processes tab (click on the “Image name” column header to alphabetically sort all the items). Oftentimes it is easy to recognize the process name - sometimes, however, You can stumble upon cases which are not so obvious. In such a situation switch to the Applications tab and this time it may be easier to find out the desired name - once You’ve found it, right-click it and choose “Go to the process”. Then You will be provided with the name of the process - already selected.
2. Right-click the process name and choose Properties. There You’ll find the process’s location.

For example, in case of Kodi the process name is kodi.exe, and its location C:\Program Files\Kodi.

3. Now You are ready to create the actual ‘wand’. Open the Notepad, copy and paste the following code into it:

   taskkill /f /im kodi.exe
start /d "C:\Program Files\Kodi" kodi.exe

4. Modify the code accordingly to Your app’s case: in the first line replace “kodi.exe” with the name of the process of the app which often freezes, in the second line replace “C:\Program Files\Kodi” with the path to the problematic app, and “kodi.exe” as in the first line.

5. Save the file as YourName.bat.

If the app has more than one processes, You can simply add another taskkill line, like in the following examples with Connectify and LibreOffice, in which 1) all the app’s processes are closed and 2) the actual executable file of the app is launched again:

Connectify:

taskkill /f /im Connectify.exe
taskkill /f /im Connectifyd.exe
start /d "C:\Program Files\Connectify" Connectify.exe

LibreOffice:

taskkill /f /im soffice.exe
taskkill /f /im soffice.bin
start /d "C:\Program Files\LibreOffice\program\" soffice.exe

.bat files are known as so-called batch files.

Pin a Batch File to the TaskBar.

You can streamline the thing even further by pinning the file You’ve just created to the Windows task bar. To do so:

1. Right-click on some empty space on the desktop and choose New › Shortcut.
2. In the following code:
   %windir%\system32\cmd.exe /c "C:\PathToYour\File.bat"
   replace C:\PathToYour\File.bat with the path where You’ve saved the .bat file (including its name) and click Next.
3. Replace cmd.exe with the name for the desktop shortcut to the ‘magic wand’ :) and confirm by Finish/Complete/Done.
4. Right-click the shortcut which has been just created and choose Properties, set Run to Minimized, confirm by Apply and Ok.
5. Drag’n’drop the shortcut to the task bar.