Question

I have a Java process that runs in the background. How can I quickly signal the process to show its window? I want a really light-weight script that can do this and can be launched from the Start Menu.

I think maybe a BAT file that checks if the lock file has been touched in the last few seconds, signal the process, otherwise, create a new one. The signal could be by creating another file that the process would be listening for.

That works, but it seems inefficient. Hesitation sounds unavoidable.

I could use Java instead of a BAT file, still that leaves the question of how to signal the background process. This only has to work in Windows, but I am good with Java so that is what I am using.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

One option would be to have that process having a listener on a port (as an example 8888), then you could send a message to that port (or do something like telnet localhost 8888). The running processes could have a separate thread listening on that port.

Another option would be to use JMX communication with the JVM – see http://download.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/technotes/guides/management/agent.html