Console Not rendering when calling exe

vbNet_guy49

New member
Joined
Jul 13, 2009
Messages
2
Programming Experience
Beginner
Ok I should start by saying hello to everyone and thanks in advance for the help. I have done some work with VBA but am very new to VB. I have Studio 2008 pro just incase anyone needs to know and i'm running on XP.

My problem. I'm trying to create a windows application that calls many different EXE's. These EXE's are old Stand alone modules created back in the 80's i think. I plan on re-writeing all the modules to work in Vb.net, but in the mean time I just want the interface to make calls to the dos exe's.

I am able to open the exe's by using the shell command however my problem is that the program doesn't render anything.
If I navigate to my C drive and then to the folder that holds all these old exe's I double click one and poof, it pops up with some old dos style graphics Dos..word art i guess is the best description. And then asks a question. What year? The user then is suppose to type the year they wish and then press enter, it then should render a new screen, display some options and ask the user to select between options 1-10.

Ok so that's what happens if i double click on the exe itself. however in my windows form application if I have a button that opens the exe from a shell call. well I get a console which is completely grey and no text. I can then type in the year and the program seems to respond, the little flashing cursor even moves to the next location as though things have been done properly but there is no text or anything to display the options or ask the user to select between options 1-10. So.. it does it.. it just doesn't show you it's doing it.
I have tried appActivate but that doesn't do anything. I have also tried using the Process class instead of the shell call but i get the same results.

If anyone can give me anything to try, or to read, or if there is more details I could provide I would appreciate any advice. Again i'm VERY new to this so please excuse my ignorance if this is a simple problem.

Thanks again. :)
 
Just some additional information that may or may not be helpful to anyone. I found that if i create a Form in Access and put a button on that form and on the click event have a Shell(Filepath) The EXE opens properly. So it works by double clicking, using Run from the start menu or using the shell command in VBA but doesn't work in VB. :mad:
 
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