running a cmd command: I want to see (get a protocol) what happens in the background

Question

When I type in a cmd window in my windows OS the following:

G:\path\MyWave.wav

Then "windows media player" starts and plays MyWave.wav . But in the cmd window it does not show what processes have run in the background between the command and the play of the file.

What I would like to have, is an output in the cmd window that shows something like this:

found G:\path\MyWave.wav
started "C:\Program Files\Windows Media Player\wmplayer.exe"

So I want to have something like a protocol, what happens in the background. Is there any possibility to get this? For example with a debugging command? Or with a debugging option?

Answer 1

Using windbg, you can attach to the CMD instance and then do .childdbg in order to debug all child processes (such as media player) as well.

A simpler approach is probably to use Process Monitor and see what's going on. If you already know the executables that are involved, you can put a filter for those.

See also: this question which is looking for an equivalent of strace.