eSpawn has just been added to the [Origo https://origo.ethz.ch/eiffelsoftware/es/trunk] repository.

espawn is a tool used to launch one or more applications or processes in the same environment as configured by finish_freezing and like tools. The applications/processes can be launched either synchronously or asynchronously and options are provided to continue or halt on a process' erroneous exit code.

espawn does launch applications and processes asynchronously but is not asynchronous itself. espawn exits when all processes have completed and not before. Users with a single-core or only one processor will not gain from the asynchronous behavior as they espawn caps the the number of asynchronous processes to the number of resident system processors/cores.

Usage Tips

Asynchronous commands can be processed by passing multiple commands with the -async switch:

espawn -async command_1 command_2 command_nth

For x64 users there is an option to launch an x86 environment for working with a 32bit environment instead of the default 64bit. This is under the condition that you have the tools installed for both x64 and x86.

To force the use of an installed 32bit environment use the -x86 switch. To use a manually configured environment, supressing the auto-config use the -manual switch. Note that -manual overrides -x86.

If you also happen to be inside an x86 (using the Visual Studio .NET Cross Tools Command Prompt or a self configured command prompt) environment you may switch to using the x64 by not specifying the -x86

Continuous Environment

If you want to continue using an automatically configured environment, as setup by espawn, there is a neat trick. Type the following in cmd.exe:

espawn cmd

You will enter a new cmd session with the environment established as dictated by espawn. Typing exit will return you to the previous cmd shell.

You can of course use all of the other options if you so wish.

More Info

There are more options so please use the following for more information:

espawn /?