On wakeup, XP tells lme I have 3 or 4 or 5...whatever...programs running but how do I

know for sure which are running? And what exactly is "running"? Does it = "open"? My understanding that programs can be a "wee bit" open as opposed to "fully" open. Can some kind soul clarify all this.
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The last time I got a msg like this, I had my firewall in the taskbar. In the systray, I had the following programs.

79 (this is the Weatherbug measured temp.)
ICQ
Messenger
My Vital Agent
Urlybird
Popup Killer
McAfee VirusScan
InCd (Packetwriting software...was presintalled.)
Sound Effects Manager
the clock
And oh yes, a little icon, a gift from XP, called "Safely Remove hardware."

John

79 (this is the Weatherbug measured temp.)
ICQ
Messenger
My Vital Agent
Urlybird
these are the ones that are probably running. if you don't want things to run in the background just type MSCONFIG and go to the start up tab and uncheck those.

Use Task Manager to see what is running on your system.

Right click in the task bar>left click Task Manager>Applications tab. This will show you the running apps.. Now select the Processes Tab to see what is lurking in the background.