How do I start a process from C#?

Question

As suggested by Matt Hamilton, the quick approach where you have limited control over the process, is to use the static Start method on the System.Diagnostics.Process class...

using System.Diagnostics;
...
Process.Start("process.exe");

The alternative is to use an instance of the Process class. This allows much more control over the process including scheduling, the type of the window it will run in and, most usefully for me, the ability to wait for the process to finish.

using System.Diagnostics;
...
Process process = new Process();
// Configure the process using the StartInfo properties.
process.StartInfo.FileName = "process.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "-n";
process.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Maximized;
process.Start();
process.WaitForExit();// Waits here for the process to exit.

This method allows far more control than I've mentioned.

You can use the System.Diagnostics.Process.Start method to start a process. You can even pass a URL as a string and it'll kick off the default browser.

Just as Matt says, use Process.Start.

You can pass a URL, or a document. They will be started by the registered application.

Example:

Process.Start("Test.Txt");

This will start Notepad.exe with Text.Txt loaded.

I used the following in my own program.

Process.Start("http://www.google.com/etc/etc/test.txt")

It's a bit basic, but it does the job for me.

var path = Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "/YourSubDirectory/yourprogram.exe");
Process.Start(new ProcessStartInfo(path));

class ProcessStart
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Process notePad = new Process();

        notePad.StartInfo.FileName   = "notepad.exe";
        notePad.StartInfo.Arguments = "ProcessStart.cs";

        notePad.Start();
    }
}