But these are also
symptoms of an application that??™s simply busy, caught up in the last task
you asked it to perform.
Either way, triggered by your first attempt to use a crashed or busy program,
Windows turns the whole window a pale version of itself while trying
to communicate with it. If you want to know whether a program has
reached this state without triggering it with a click, just try moving the
mouse over the edges of the window; if the mouse cursor doesn??™t change to
the familiar ???resize??? arrows (and given that it??™s a resizable window), the program
has probably stopped responding.
So, how do you tell the difference between a crashed program and a busy
one? Well, Vista can??™t even do that reliably, instead showing you a window
that looks like the one in Figure 6-5 when you try to close it. The solution is
to be patient and use your best instincts.
But patience only gets you so far. After waiting an intolerable length of time,
say, three to four seconds, one has to wonder whether the program will ever
Figure 6-5. When you see this message, it means that Windows doesn??™t know whether the
program you??™re trying to use has crashed, or is simply busy
Crashes and Error Messages | 299
Troubleshooting
start responding. If you??™re through waiting, you can go ahead and elect to
close the program, a strategy that works some of the time.
If an application window is visible, it??™s easy enough to click
the small ?— button on the application title bar to close it.
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