What to do when a particular program in Windows 7 won't open?

Question

I am using Lyx (word processing software) on a remote computer which has Windows 7. I was working with R (programming language) and Lyx simultaneously while accessing the remote computer through Chrome RDP, when Lyx stopped responding. R was still working fine. I opened Task Manager and clicked End Task after selecting Lyx. Then, when I opened Lyx again, I could see pinwheel with mouse pointer for a moment but Lyx didn't open. I checked in Task Manager again and it didn't show Lyx in 'Applications' tab. I checked in 'Processes' tab and saw 'lyx.exe'. After ending this process I tried to open Lyx again but it didn't open. Unfortunately I can't restart computer because I don't have administrative rights. What should I do? R still runs fine.

Answer 1

You could open task manager(ctrl-shift-esc), and end task explorer.exe then (file..new task..explorer.exe) start it again. (I can't vouch for whether or not you will lose your connection during this though)

You could also end task other processes. (It may be a memory thing. I've had that even with 16GB RAM, you could end task any unnecessary processes)

You have already made sure to end task any existing processes of the one you are opening, before opening it, that's right.

You could run process monitor and try to see what files or registry entries it is dealing with, for clues as to why it is not opening. I haven't used process monitor for a program that won't open before, but you could try that.