Windows: how can I pause a program execution and restart a few reboots later?











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According to this SU question I can use Windows Task Manager to pause a process execution.



How can I pause a process, save its state to disk, and restart it a few days later? Possibly I'll have rebooted my PC a few times before I restart it.










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  • A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
    – AFH
    Dec 4 at 14:25

















up vote
0
down vote

favorite












According to this SU question I can use Windows Task Manager to pause a process execution.



How can I pause a process, save its state to disk, and restart it a few days later? Possibly I'll have rebooted my PC a few times before I restart it.










share|improve this question






















  • A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
    – AFH
    Dec 4 at 14:25















up vote
0
down vote

favorite









up vote
0
down vote

favorite











According to this SU question I can use Windows Task Manager to pause a process execution.



How can I pause a process, save its state to disk, and restart it a few days later? Possibly I'll have rebooted my PC a few times before I restart it.










share|improve this question













According to this SU question I can use Windows Task Manager to pause a process execution.



How can I pause a process, save its state to disk, and restart it a few days later? Possibly I'll have rebooted my PC a few times before I restart it.







windows-10 process cpu-usage






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asked Dec 4 at 13:59









Julien__

1084




1084












  • A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
    – AFH
    Dec 4 at 14:25




















  • A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
    – AFH
    Dec 4 at 14:25


















A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
– AFH
Dec 4 at 14:25






A paused program can be restarted after a Shut Down, which hibernates (with default settings) and all process states are preserved; but a Restart will lose the run state of all programs. Unless a program has been specifically written to save its state on a signal, the only way I know that you can do what you want on an arbitrary program is to run it in a Virtual Machine, which can be suspended, then resumed at any time, regardless of any intervening restarts. (I have just seen that I have crossed with David Baumann's answer, which makes more or less the same point.)
– AFH
Dec 4 at 14:25












2 Answers
2






active

oldest

votes

















up vote
1
down vote



accepted










You probably could.



Actually following problems: The process could have some descriptors open like Registry, file, TCP, system handles...



What I suggest du use in this case would be a virtual machine (VMWare, VirtualBox...), here you can save the state of a windows computer, and even transfer the state to another machine (there are some limitations especially regarding the CPU).



Suspend virtual machine






share|improve this answer





















  • Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:41












  • Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
    – davidbaumann
    Dec 4 at 14:58


















up vote
0
down vote













That question's answers are about suspending a process on the CPU, that is halt the execution of the code temporarily to save CPU usage.



What you describe is closing the program.



To find a way to stop a process of a given program on the CPU ( assuming it was just one process and not any child processes) and then capture all the ram space that program has reserved for it and then save that to the hard drive would be wasteful compared to simply saving your work/progress and closing the program normally.






share|improve this answer





















  • Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:42












  • @Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
    – Ricardo S.
    Dec 4 at 15:55













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2 Answers
2






active

oldest

votes








2 Answers
2






active

oldest

votes









active

oldest

votes






active

oldest

votes








up vote
1
down vote



accepted










You probably could.



Actually following problems: The process could have some descriptors open like Registry, file, TCP, system handles...



What I suggest du use in this case would be a virtual machine (VMWare, VirtualBox...), here you can save the state of a windows computer, and even transfer the state to another machine (there are some limitations especially regarding the CPU).



Suspend virtual machine






share|improve this answer





















  • Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:41












  • Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
    – davidbaumann
    Dec 4 at 14:58















up vote
1
down vote



accepted










You probably could.



Actually following problems: The process could have some descriptors open like Registry, file, TCP, system handles...



What I suggest du use in this case would be a virtual machine (VMWare, VirtualBox...), here you can save the state of a windows computer, and even transfer the state to another machine (there are some limitations especially regarding the CPU).



Suspend virtual machine






share|improve this answer





















  • Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:41












  • Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
    – davidbaumann
    Dec 4 at 14:58













up vote
1
down vote



accepted







up vote
1
down vote



accepted






You probably could.



Actually following problems: The process could have some descriptors open like Registry, file, TCP, system handles...



What I suggest du use in this case would be a virtual machine (VMWare, VirtualBox...), here you can save the state of a windows computer, and even transfer the state to another machine (there are some limitations especially regarding the CPU).



Suspend virtual machine






share|improve this answer












You probably could.



Actually following problems: The process could have some descriptors open like Registry, file, TCP, system handles...



What I suggest du use in this case would be a virtual machine (VMWare, VirtualBox...), here you can save the state of a windows computer, and even transfer the state to another machine (there are some limitations especially regarding the CPU).



Suspend virtual machine







share|improve this answer












share|improve this answer



share|improve this answer










answered Dec 4 at 14:22









davidbaumann

1,834722




1,834722












  • Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:41












  • Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
    – davidbaumann
    Dec 4 at 14:58


















  • Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:41












  • Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
    – davidbaumann
    Dec 4 at 14:58
















Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
– Julien__
Dec 4 at 14:41






Ok I'll read about setting up one VM. Can I do this with docker? It seems more efficient.
– Julien__
Dec 4 at 14:41














Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
– davidbaumann
Dec 4 at 14:58




Docker has a really nice documentation. I guess it depends on the hypervisor it uses.
– davidbaumann
Dec 4 at 14:58












up vote
0
down vote













That question's answers are about suspending a process on the CPU, that is halt the execution of the code temporarily to save CPU usage.



What you describe is closing the program.



To find a way to stop a process of a given program on the CPU ( assuming it was just one process and not any child processes) and then capture all the ram space that program has reserved for it and then save that to the hard drive would be wasteful compared to simply saving your work/progress and closing the program normally.






share|improve this answer





















  • Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:42












  • @Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
    – Ricardo S.
    Dec 4 at 15:55

















up vote
0
down vote













That question's answers are about suspending a process on the CPU, that is halt the execution of the code temporarily to save CPU usage.



What you describe is closing the program.



To find a way to stop a process of a given program on the CPU ( assuming it was just one process and not any child processes) and then capture all the ram space that program has reserved for it and then save that to the hard drive would be wasteful compared to simply saving your work/progress and closing the program normally.






share|improve this answer





















  • Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:42












  • @Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
    – Ricardo S.
    Dec 4 at 15:55















up vote
0
down vote










up vote
0
down vote









That question's answers are about suspending a process on the CPU, that is halt the execution of the code temporarily to save CPU usage.



What you describe is closing the program.



To find a way to stop a process of a given program on the CPU ( assuming it was just one process and not any child processes) and then capture all the ram space that program has reserved for it and then save that to the hard drive would be wasteful compared to simply saving your work/progress and closing the program normally.






share|improve this answer












That question's answers are about suspending a process on the CPU, that is halt the execution of the code temporarily to save CPU usage.



What you describe is closing the program.



To find a way to stop a process of a given program on the CPU ( assuming it was just one process and not any child processes) and then capture all the ram space that program has reserved for it and then save that to the hard drive would be wasteful compared to simply saving your work/progress and closing the program normally.







share|improve this answer












share|improve this answer



share|improve this answer










answered Dec 4 at 14:12









Ricardo S.

1429




1429












  • Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:42












  • @Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
    – Ricardo S.
    Dec 4 at 15:55




















  • Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
    – Julien__
    Dec 4 at 14:42












  • @Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
    – Ricardo S.
    Dec 4 at 15:55


















Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
– Julien__
Dec 4 at 14:42






Wasteful for computer resources but it'll save some programmer time. If I have a computationally intensive task that can take up to a few days, I really want to pause and restart it several time. But I don't want to mess with it's code and add save hooks everywhere.
– Julien__
Dec 4 at 14:42














@Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
– Ricardo S.
Dec 4 at 15:55






@Julien__ Interesting take. I admit I was just thinking of computer resources. I had the thought however that perhaps there might be a virtualization option. Without Vmware and having to install a guest OS. But I wouldn't know.
– Ricardo S.
Dec 4 at 15:55




















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