Windows 10: Windows 10 Launching Multiple Instances of Programs

There must be a setting I need to adjust - sometimes when my mouse gets near the bottom of the screen where the Taskbar is (not sure that's the name of it) multiple instances of the same program will launch. It's very distracting while trying to work. I'm on a laptop - maybe there's some setting with the trackpad? I don't know. It's awful though.

:)

 

Windows 10 Virtual Desktops and multiple program instances

I'm having an issue with the new Virtual Desktops in Windows 10. For example:

1. From Desktop 1, double click the file "test1.xlsx". This will open the file in a new instance of Excel (specifically 2010, in my case), on Desktop 1.
   
2. From Desktop 2, double click the file "test2.xlsx". This will change the desktop to Desktop 1 and open the file in the same instance of Excel as from step 1.
   

I've found this to also be true with Notepad++, so my guess is that this behavior occurs with any program that opens multiple files in a single instance. However, these are the two programs I generally use in this way.

I've found a number of ways to disable DDE for Excel, but this isn't what I want to do. If I open a second file from a desktop that already contains an instance of the program that should open it, I want to use that instance.

I've found manual ways of opening a second instance, moving it to the correct desktop, and then opening the file in that instance. However, the process is slightly different for each program and overall is, at best, clunky. Not to mention that now a third file will open in the most recently used instance, and not necessarily the correct one, requiring the whole process to start over again.

 

How to prevent multiple instances of an application

Hi all

I have a problem with one of my applications.. I use some CAM software to generate large text files (G code for machine tools). The CAM program then launches another text editor application that opens the text file created and allows me to hand edit it
and then send it via RS-232 cable to the machine tool.

The problem is that the Text editor program is old, like Windows XP era old.. It's propriety software made by the the machine tool company and it is the only thing i can use with this machine tool. I've set it to Windows XP compatible mode and it works
OK, in the Windows 10 environment.. The problem is that because it's launched by another program, if i forget to close it down before re-posting any changes in the CAM software, it causes another instance of the editor to be launched. In this situation
i would expect the text editor to simply load the new text file, but instead it launches a whole new instance of the editor.

Is there a way to prevent multiple instances of the same program? Perhaps some kind of command line switch etc?

I have tried using a batch file that performs a "taskkill" operation to end the program if it's already running before launching it again, thereby preventing the multiple instances, but this seems to interfere with the COM port operation and causes it to
lock up and stop working. Incidentally the same thing happens when multiple instances of the editor program are open. The only way to get the COM port to work again is a system reboot..

It's getting really frustrating having to do re-boots just because i forget to close a program down..

Anyone have any ideas how i can get around this problem?

Cheers

Lee

 

Batch file to launch multiple instances of the Chrome browser, each instance with unique tabs to websites

I searched the Internet quite a bit, thinking someone else wanted to do this, or had a batch already written for this scenario, but my searches came up with nothing. Hopefully I'm not duplicating someone else.

There are a couple of different batch files out there that will launch a single instance of the browser, with multiple tabs opening to various different websites. They are simplistic and straight-forward.

However, I wanted to launch multiple instances of the Chrome browser, each instance with its own unique group of tabs to websites. The way the currently existing batch files are written, they don't work, they need significant tweaking. Here is an example
of how to do this:

Code:

@echo off

"%C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\Chrome\Application\Chrome.exe" /n

start chrome www.microsoft.com

start chrome www.aol.com

"%C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\Chrome\Application\Chrome.exe" /n

start chrome www.nbcnews.com

start chrome www.abcnews.com

@echo off

"%C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\Chrome\Application\Chrome.exe" /n

start chrome www.yahoo.com

start chrome www.msn.com

This launches three instances of Chrome: one instance has tabs open to microsoft and aol, the second has tabs open to nbcnews, etc.

Note that this does not work for Internet Explorer. I've already verified. Perhaps there is a way to do it with IE, maybe someone else can figure it out. I haven't tested with other browsers.