If Premiere Elements 8 does not properly exit or does not restart, try this

Question

Pending a fix or advice from Adobe, I've written a tiny program to help with problems of Premiere Elements 8 not shutting down properly.
"PE8 Runner" is a small utility which...
- Asks you whether you want to run Premiere Elements 8.0 with or without the welcome screen
- Checks after you close the program whether it really has closed, or whether its process is still running
- Asks you whether you want to terminate the unclosed process (so you don't have to use Windows Task Manager to do it).
INSTALLATION
None.  You can run PE8 Runner.exe from anywhere on your PC.  But it assumes you have Premiere Elements installed
in the default location (C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Premiere Elements 8.0)
USE
Run PE8 Runner.
Answer yes or no to the question about using the welcome screen.
(If you choose not to use the welcome screen you will go straight to the program
and then you must open or create a project using the normal menu).
Use Premiere Elements 8 as normal.
After you close Premiere Elements 8, about 10 or 20 seconds afterwards
you may see a window pop up telling you that the Premiere Elements process
is still running (and using your PC's resources), and asking you if you want
to terminate the process.
Unless you are in fact still using the program, answer "yes".
LIABILITY
The author (me) has developed and tested the program on a virus-protected system
using Windows XP SP3.  Every precaution has been taken to ensure that
it is reliable, but it's up to you to choose whether to use it or not, and the author
accepts no responsibility for the outcome.
Please test it on an unimportant project before using it on something real.
I have not been able to test it on other versions of Windows and would be interested in any reports.
Download link http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/9/22/1451533/PE8%20Runner.zip - it's a small download.  Source code is included.

Answer 1

I really can not understand their logic.  It is showing in Task Manager because the process (Adobe's exe) is still running and using the CPU.  I know this because it causes a slowdown on my system as well.  They are either assuming that Task Manager is reporting a ghost so it is an OS system, or they are claiming that they are making a call to a Microsoft function in a redistributable .dll or a function in a compile time library written by Microsoft, and that function is not operating as specified by Microsoft.
I know that it isn't a ghost report; the process is running.  If it is a failure in a .dll or library, Adobe will still have to issue an update to us after reporting it to Microsoft and MS putting out a developer's update. We can not report it to Microsoft because we do not know what functions they are calling.
It really sounds like their application is not distributing the exit call to all of its processes.  Without a design map and the code, it is all conjecture and I really shouldn't be guessing at what I really don't know.
Based on how many folks all see this, I can't imagine how this slipped through testing.  Oh well, it did and most organizations have one slip through every now and then.  The real important thing is how Adobe responds to the discovery.  I personally would be happier with a "We have been notified of this issue and our developers are working to recreate it and then correct any problems we identify."  It sounds like tech support has been outsourced and is too far removed from the situation to really respond with anything more than deflection. I have run into this with Digital River and their overseas call center.  They could answer by the script, but they really could not get to the folks who could provide answers or solutions. This kind of support is what turned me away from a large scale installation of Adobe consumer applications.  I have found better stability and support with the professional line of products.
I am looking forward to fix for this and any other issues.  PE is fun to play with.
KK