Hello, I wrote a small batch that amongst other things checks if MS Outlook is running, if so closes outlook and backs up the pst files then restarts outlook. I do this using PV.exe then checking the errorlevel output and if it is 1 (not running) I start the backup, otherwise the taskkill /IM outlook.exe terminates outlook. pv > C:\result.txt findstr /I "OUTLOOK" C:\result.txt if ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO START My problem is that this only runs once and as we all know users sometimes will start multiple instances of Outlook.exe I'm by no means a programmer so take it easy on me, I've been trying unsuccessfully to write a loop that will cicle through the above code until error level =1 (not running) but I have failed miserably. HELP! Thanks.

:LOOP pv | find /I "outlok.exe" > Nul || goto :START taskkill /IM outlook.exe goto :LOOP :START

you don't have lable called "start" and your GOTO command pointing to no where. :START pv > C:\result.txt findstr /I "OUTLOOK" C:\result.txt if ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO START

amlife, you posted an endless loop! Reread the original question and think about...

Thank you all for your ideas. I wanted to let you know that i actually found a very easy way to do it. PV.exe has two switches that allows me to do this. -k kill process -k outlook* will kill one of anything starting with the word outlook -r[errorlevel] will continue looping until errorlevel=1 or 0 (1=yes 0=no) -f will suppress asking for confirmation. So my problem was solved by this simple line pv -k outlook* -r1 -f Thank you all once again this is a great board. I've found more answers here than anywhere else on the net. My hat is off to you all.