[megglz]

I've created this tutorial on using some basic shell commands with Silverlight 4 COM Interop services. These are just some things I have come across and solved myself, which may be useful to others!

Here we are going to launch a program and pass through a username/password from the OOB app.

Create a Silverlight Application project in Silverlight4. Uncheck the option to host as a web app.

First - some things you'll need to do before a successful build:
Right click project, add reference. Choose System Core under .NET and say ok.



Right click project, add reference. Browse to 'Microsoft SDKs\Silverlight\v4.0\Libraries\Client\Microsoft.CSharp.dll', and say ok.



Right click project, go to Properties. Check 'Enable Out-of-Browser settings'. Click the button Out-Of-Browser settings.



Scroll down and check 'show install menu' and 'require elevated trust'. Save all.



Here is a simple xaml page with a button that says "Open Program".



Mainpage.xaml

<UserControl x:Class="MyClientTest.MainPage"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
    xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
    mc:Ignorable="d"
    d:DesignHeight="300" d:DesignWidth="400">

    <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White">
        <StackPanel>
            <Button x:Name="OpenProgram" Content="Open Program" Click="OpenProgram_Click"  />
        </StackPanel>
    </Grid>
</UserControl>

Mainpage.xaml.cs

Here I am going to open a sample test textfile with notepad.

Copy the code below into your MainPage.cs file. Take note to keep your own Namespace name. You may need to import System.Runtime.InteropServices.Automation

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Net;
using System.Windows;
using System.Windows.Controls;
using System.Windows.Documents;
using System.Windows.Input;
using System.Windows.Media;
using System.Windows.Media.Animation;
using System.Windows.Shapes;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices.Automation;

namespace MyClientTest
{
    /*Note: ComAutomationFactory has been renamed to 
    AutomationFactory in Silverlight4
*/
    public partial class MainPage : UserControl
    {
        public MainPage()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }

        private void btnInstall_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
        {
            if (Application.Current.InstallState == InstallState.NotInstalled)

                Application.Current.Install();
        }

        private void OpenProgram_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
        {     
             using (dynamic shell = AutomationFactory.CreateObject("WScript.Shell"))
            {
                 shell.Run(@"C:\Windows\notepad.exe C:\Users\yourusername\Desktop\test.txt");
            }
        }

    }
}

Build and run the code. It should open like this



Click the button, and notepad opens with your chosen txt file loaded



Some things to note:
Here I used a single pair of double quotes when opening notepad.exe, but in my workplace I have encountered that
when opening a program file within shell.Run() from C:\Program Files\ you may need to surround it with three double quotes. ("'s).

Example:

using (dynamic shell = AutomationFactory.CreateObject("WScript.Shell"))
            {
                shell.Run(@"""C:\Program Files\Program\programfile.exe """);
            }

And when passing parameters through along with the program file executable, it can be achieved in the following way. In this example, I am passing through a username and a password.

using (dynamic shell = AutomationFactory.CreateObject("WScript.Shell"))
            {
                shell.Run(@"""C:\Program Files\Program\programfiles.exe """ + "-username user" + "-password password");
            }

This post has been edited by irishgirl: 15 August 2010 - 06:19 AM

[megglz]

Thank you