Shutting Down Programs In Windows?

Aileron · May 21, 2023

Why is there a difference between right clicking an open nonresponsive tab and choosing "close window" vs. ending the process in Task Manager? When a game crashes the first option never works but the second works in under a second. Shouldn't they be doing the exact same thing?

TylerD321 · May 21, 2023

The point of ending the process in task manager is to allow you to close programs that don’t close when you click the x as described.

Eigenvektor · May 21, 2023

1 hour ago, Aileron said:

Why is there a difference between right clicking an open nonresponsive tab and choosing "close window" vs. ending the process in Task Manager?

Clicking on close "asks" the program to close itself (by sending a "close" command to its message queue). This allows the process to perform whatever is necessary to shut down cleanly. Ending the process kills it immediately.

If a program is non-responsive the first option will no longer work, because the program is in a state where it has stopped processing its message queue (this is also how Windows determines that it is non-responsive). At some point Windows should ask you if you want to force quit the program, which will then terminate the process like task manager does.