Clerk Kant

I've got a call to ShellExecute from VB3 (ok ok I know) running under Windows 2000:

API% = ShellExecute(hWnd%, "open", URL$, ByVal 0&, "", WindowStyle%)

where URL$ is of course a long path name.

This works fine UNTIL you make the decision to run an activeX exe from else where in the code.

After you do this, and the process has (definitely) terminated, the call to ShellExecute no longer works with long path names. As its a URL, I can't simply convert the path to a short name.

Any body got any ideas? Am currently trying to slash my wrists with a floppy disk.