How to see if a program is running?

Question

Hello,
I need to implement a program that checks if a program called "Thing.exe" is runing. If it is not running it launches "Thing.exe" and if it is kills "Thing.exe". This is the first time I have to program something like this in java and I'm lost with the syntax. The problem is basically I don't know how to check if "Thing.exe" is there running happily.
A little bit of code:
public class Main {
    public static void main() {
        Runtime application = Runtime.getRuntime();
        try {
            if (isRunning()) {
                application.exec("taskkill.exe /F /IM notepad.exe");
            } else {
                application.exec("cmd.exe /k start ThingLauncher.bat");
        } catch (Exception ex) {
            ex.printStackTrace();
    public static boolean isRunning(){
        boolean running=false;
        int[] pid;
        pid=Process.getProcess("Thing.exe"); // <-- obviously this is wrong
        if(pid.length!=0){
            running=true;
        return running;
}Hope someone can help me.
Thanks,
Onditz

Answer 1

A simple way is to launch a small vbscript and capture its output.
Example : [Check if a program or process is running (Windows)|http://www.rgagnon.com/javadetails/java-0610.html]
Bye.