maybe there is a way to follow the process tree or kill cmd.exe in such a way that all children will be also killed?

Yes. Use Win32::CreateProcess and the include CREATE_NEW_PROCESS_GROUP. Use it to start cmd.exe and then supply your complex command line.

When you kill cmd.exe, any child processes it has created will be killed also.

Some further info on this:

1. You must use perl's built in kill, with a signal number 21 (SIGBREAK).

   Win32::Process::Kill() only gets the immediate child, not the group.

2. Only processes that share the same console will be killed.

   That means that if all the processes in your complex commands are simple command line apps, then all children and their grandchildren etc. will be killed as a group.

   But if any of the processes allocate their own console, or do not use a console (eg. notepad.exe), then they will survive. I do not have a simple solution for these.

---

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In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.

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Better yet, see Re: Killing children's of children & Re^3: Killing children's of children

Thanks a lot! I've thought so much and determined to do like this (taskkill.exe) is windows native program (I've recently read about it.. yes, also at perlmonks.org)):


my $pid = system (1, 'FOR /R C:\ %G IN (*.*) DO type %G');
sleep(2);
print `taskkill.exe /PID $pid /T /F`;
[download]

To detect the state of process, I use this:


#return (kill 0,$pid); - don't know but it doesn't work.. 
my $throbj;
if (Win32::Process::Open($throbj,$pid,0))
{
    my $ecode;
    $throbj->GetExitCode ($ecode);
    if ($ecode==Win32::Process::STILL_ACTIVE)
        { return 1; } #STILL ACTIVE
    return 0;
}
[download]

I'm a bit sad that I've read too late about Win32::Job and Proc-Background but my resulting solution seems to work well...

Guys, thanks once again! ) you helped me very very.