Detecting software installed in PC

[Lukalo]

Hi everyone

Im trying to make a program that detects all the software installed in the computer, however i've got no clue where to start, i tried searching here and in google but didnt find anything about this topic (Perhaps i didnt use the correct keywords/search terms). so if anyone knows something or know where to find about it, that information will be most apreciated.

and for the curious.., im trying to develop this tool in order to be able to keep an inventary of my software vs my licenses, so my little company wont get in big troubles.

Lukalo

[toadaly]

There are already inexpensive commercial products that do this for you, but if you insist on writing one yourself, I probably wouldn't use Java since it has no hooks into the Windows API calls that give you this information.

However, you can exec the "reg query" command from java. Here is a crappy example with no error checking etc.

import java.io.*;

public class junk {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {

      String cmd = "reg query \"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft"+
           "\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Uninstall\"";

      // This one will show you  software categories installed
      //String cmd = "reg query \"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\Software\"";

      Process p = Runtime.getRuntime().exec(cmd);
      
      Thread.sleep(2000l); //terrible, the right way is p.waitFor
      
      //p.waitFor();  /* this command sometimes hangs on windows !!!???*/

      InputStream in = p.getInputStream();

      byte[] bytes = new byte[16384];

      StringBuffer buf = new StringBuffer();

      while(true) {
	  int num = in.read(bytes);

	  if(num == -1) break;

	  buf.append(new String(bytes,0,num,"UTF-8"));
      }

      System.out.println(buf.toString());

      p.destroy();

    }

}

[Lukalo]

@ Toadaly
Thanks for the code... it gave me some good hints at where to get started....

@ artonlinehome
???? it does?... well nothing happened here.... perhaps a Vista Bug?? XD

Anyway thanks for the help

[toadaly]

dont do this , it will delete all reg keys

Uh. No it won't. Please don't scare people without knowing what you're talking about.