On a cmd prompt or bat file, I issue the following: start textpad myfile.txt and it works fine. If the program textpad does not exist on the computer, then an error sound and a popup occurs which the OK button must be pushed. I desire to trap this error so that I could do something like start textpad myfile.txt || start notepad myfile.txt where the || implies that if the start of textpad is not successful, then the start of notepad should occur. HOWEVER, I still get the error sound and requirement of hitting OK. My intent is to avoid the sound and the requirement of any user intervention. I have also tried the following bat approach below, to no avail. start textpad if not %ERRORLEVEL% == 0 GOTO END start notepad :END Any help would be great. thanks ted