Need help with TCP/IP client access from Windows

[Martin Pool]

"Eric S. Raymond" wrote:
> 
> Mike Fletcher <mcfletch at vrtelecom.com>:
> > About the only way I know to do this at all reliably...
> >
> > import os
> > os.system( 'start %s'%url )
> >
> > Which does whatever the user has defined as the proper thing to do with
> > urls, normally, launch IE or Netscape.
> 
> Really?  That sounds perfect.  Just for my information, what is `start'?

To a unix person, you could say that it forks into another task, 
uses a heuristic to work out how to handle the arguments, and 
executes that program.  It's a bit bizarre.

The help from NT4WSsp5 is below.

-- 
 /\\\  Mincom | Martin Pool          | martinp at mincom.com
// \\\        | Software Engineer    | Phone: +61 7 3303-3333
\\ ///        | Mincom Ltd.          | 
 \///         | Teneriffe, Brisbane  | Speaking for myself only



> help start
Starts a separate window to run a specified program or command.

START ["title"] [/Dpath] [/I] [/MIN] [/MAX] [/SEPARATE | /SHARED]
      [/LOW | /NORMAL | /HIGH | /REALTIME] [/WAIT] [/B]
[command/program] [param
eters]

    "title"     Title to display in  window title bar.
    path        Starting directory
    I           The new environment will be the original environment
passed
                to the cmd.exe and not the current environment.
    MIN         Start window minimized
    MAX         Start window maximized
    SEPARATE    Start 16-bit Windows program in separate memory space
    SHARED      Start 16-bit Windows program in shared memory space
    LOW         Start application in the IDLE priority class
    NORMAL      Start application in the NORMAL priority class
    HIGH        Start application in the HIGH priority class
    REALTIME    Start application in the REALTIME priority class
    WAIT        Start application and wait for it to terminate
    B           Start application without creating a new window. The
                application has ^C handling ignored. Unless the
application
                enables ^C processing, ^Break is the only way to
interrupt the
                application
    command/program
                If it is an internal cmd command or a batch file then
                the command processor is run with the /K switch to
cmd.exe.
                This means that the window will remain after the command
                has been run.

                If it is not an internal cmd command or batch file then
                it is a program and will run as either a windowed
application
                or a console application.

    parameters  These are the parameters passed to the command/program


If Command Extensions are enabled, external command invocation
through the command line or the START command changes as follows:

non-executable files may be invoked through their file association just
    by typing the name of the file as a command.  (e.g.  WORD.DOC would
    launch the application associated with the .DOC file extension).
    See the ASSOC and FTYPE commands for how to create these
    associations from within a command script.

When executing an application that is a 32-bit GUI application, CMD.EXE
    does not wait for the application to terminate before returning to
    the command prompt.  This new behavior does NOT occur if executing
    within a command script.

When executing a command line whose first token is CMD without an
    extension or path qualifier, then replaces CMD with the value of the
    COMSPEC variable, thus avoiding picking up random versions of
    CMD.EXE when you least expect them.

When executing a command line whose first token does NOT contain an
    extension, then CMD.EXE uses the value of the PATHEXT
    environment variable to determine which extensions to look for
    and in what order.  The default value for the PATHEXT variable
    is:

        .COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD

    Notice the syntax is the same as the PATH variable, with
    semicolons separating the different elements.

When executing a command, if there is no match on any extension, then
looks to see if the name, without any extension, matches a directory
name
and if it does, the START command launches the Explorer on that path.
If done from the command line, it is the equivalent to doing a CD /D
to that path.