Win XP Task Scheduler

Question

Is it possible to run a task from the Windows XP Task Scheduler after 1 task is finished?

I have a list of programs that it should start up (program1.exe, program2.exe, program3.exe) I would like it that program2.exe starts X seconds/minutes after program1.exe has succesfully started.

program1.exe would be the first task to start after log on program2.exe would need to start when program1.exe is running (so not starting up) program3.exe would start after program2.exe is running.

Is this even remotely possible with the Task Scheduler in XP?

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If this is not possible are there any recommendation programs that would do the job?

Answer 1

Make program 1 produce some sort of output when it is complete. Have program 2 start at the same time as program 1, but loop until it finds that output. Have program 2 also produce an output that program 3 will be waiting for.

If you can't make the programs do this, then schedule just your own script that will determine when to start each program in a similar way. I assume each program does something that you can see somewhere.

Answer 2

Could you write a batch script to run program 1, sleep however long you want, run program 2, etc? It would look something like this:

program1.exe
timeout 60 /NOBREAK > NULL
program2.exe
timeout 60 /NOBREAK > NULL
program3.exe

The timeout trick I got from https://stackoverflow.com/a/4317055/686041