Executing msg.exe from Visual Basic application - vb.net

Question

I am trying to take text fields for old hostname, new hostname, username, and password and remotely change computer names. That part is working fantastic. It was all great until my manager saw it in action, since we have a policy against downloading and using freeware.
It's not freeware if I made it. Unfortunately, he sent it to my director, and know my director knows I know a little bit about Visual Basic, so he wants to loop the names from a CSV file, change the name, and send a message to the end user instructing them to save their files and reboot.
Unfortunately, net send has gone the way of XP since Vista. However, from Vista - Win8.1, there's a utility called msg.exe in C:\Windows\System32. In order to use it, the target computer has to have the registry value AllowRemoteRPC in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Services set to 1.
So here's what the app does:
Reads the DWORD key AllowRemoteRPC and stores it to a variable (MyVal), changes the key to 1, attempts to send the message alerting the user they need to restart, changes the key back to MyVal, and then executes netdom renamecomputer and renames the PC. Everything works perfectly EXCEPT sending the message. I can open up a command prompt and type:
msg /server:hostname * /v /time:3600 "my message here
And it works perfectly (after manually editing the registry key to the needed value).
However, running it from VB doesn't work. Here's what I've tried:
"msg /server:" & hostname & " * /v /time:3600 ""my message here"""
"cmd.exe /D /c msg /server:" & hostname & " * /v /time:3600 ""my message here"""
Neither seems to work. I know the registry value is being changed. I put message boxes after each step in my and refreshed the regedit to actually see the value of the DWORD key, and it is changing. Everything APPEARS to be going smoothly, the message is just not getting sent.
I do have these commands running as arguments to a function I created in order to create a process so I could output the streamreader to a listbox.
Here's my code. Please keep in mind, I'm barely over 2 months into learning visual basic, so it's probably not the prettiest code out there:
Imports System
Imports System.IO
Imports System.Diagnostics
Imports System.Security.Permissions
Imports Microsoft.Win32
Public Class applicationMain
Private Sub btnExecute_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles btnExecute.Click
Dim oldPC As String = txtOldPC.Text
Dim newPC As String = txtNewPC.Text
Dim username As String = txtUsername.Text
Dim password As String = txtPassword.Text
If oldPC <> "" And newPC <> "" And username <> "" And password <> "" Then
Dim MyReg As Microsoft.Win32.RegistryKey = Microsoft.Win32.RegistryKey.OpenRemoteBaseKey(Microsoft.Win32.RegistryHive.LocalMachine, oldPC)
Dim MyRegKey As Microsoft.Win32.RegistryKey
Dim MyVal As String
lbOutput.Items.Clear()
MyRegKey = MyReg.OpenSubKey("System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server")
MyVal = MyRegKey.GetValue("AllowRemoteRPC", RegistryValueKind.DWord)
MyRegKey.Close()
lbOutput.Items.Add("Processing registry changes...")
Try
MyRegKey = MyReg.OpenSubKey("System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server", True)
MyRegKey.SetValue("AllowRemoteRPC", &H1, RegistryValueKind.DWord)
Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show("An Error Has Occured:" & vbCrLf & vbCrLf & ex.ToString())
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
lbOutput.Items.Add("ABORTED!")
Exit Sub
End Try
lbOutput.Items.Add("Success!")
lbOutput.Items.Add("Sending message to user:")
Try
ExecuteCommand("cmd.exe", "/D /c msg /SERVER:" & oldPC & ".na.int.grp * /v /TIME:3600 ""Changes have been made by IS to your computer that require a restart. Please save your files and restart your computer to avoid service interruption.""")
Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show("An Error Has Occured:" & vbCrLf & vbCrLf & ex.ToString())
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
lbOutput.Items.Add("ABORTED!")
MyRegKey = MyReg.OpenSubKey("System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server", True)
MyRegKey.SetValue("AllowRemoteRPC", MyVal, RegistryValueKind.DWord)
Exit Sub
End Try
lbOutput.Items.Add(" Message: ""Changes have been made by IS to your computer that require a restart. Please save your files and restart your computer to avoid service interruption."" ")
lbOutput.Items.Add("Reverting registry changes...")
Try
MyRegKey = MyReg.OpenSubKey("System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server", True)
MyRegKey.SetValue("AllowRemoteRPC", MyVal, RegistryValueKind.DWord)
Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show("An Error Has Occured:" & vbCrLf & vbCrLf & ex.ToString())
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
lbOutput.Items.Add("ABORTED!")
Exit Sub
End Try
Try
ExecuteCommand("netdom", "renamecomputer " & oldPC & " /newname:" & newPC & " /userD:na\" & username & " /passwordd:" & password & " /usero:na\" & username & " /passwordo:" & password & " /Force")
Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show("An Error Has Occured:" & vbCrLf & vbCrLf & ex.ToString())
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
lbOutput.Items.Add("ABORTED!")
Exit Sub
End Try
lbOutput.Items.Add("Success!")
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
lbOutput.Items.Add("Rename successful for " & oldPC & "!")
lbOutput.Items.Add("******************************************************************")
lbOutput.Items.Add("")
End If
End Sub
Private Function ExecuteCommand(ByVal cmd As String, ByVal arguments As String)
Dim cmdProcess As New Process()
Dim cmdProcessStartInfo As New ProcessStartInfo()
Dim cmdStreamReader As IO.StreamReader
Dim output As String
cmdProcessStartInfo.UseShellExecute = False
cmdProcessStartInfo.CreateNoWindow = True
cmdProcessStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = True
cmdProcessStartInfo.FileName = cmd
cmdProcessStartInfo.Arguments = arguments
cmdProcess.StartInfo = cmdProcessStartInfo
cmdProcess.Start()
cmdStreamReader = cmdProcess.StandardOutput
Do While cmdStreamReader.EndOfStream = False
output = cmdStreamReader.ReadLine()
lbOutput.SelectedIndex = lbOutput.Items.Count - 1
lbOutput.Items.Add(output)
Loop
cmdProcess.WaitForExit()
cmdProcess.Close()
Return vbNull
End Function
End Class

Answer 1

What do you know. There's actually nothing wrong with my code at all. While trying to play around with the paths variable, I decided "Fuhgeddaboudit, I'll just add the executable to the project!". Right clicked the project, Add -> Existing Item. Selected Executable as the type, and went to C:\Windows\System32 and, get this now, msg.exe wasn't there. At all. Opened Explorer and went to System32, msg.exe was there. For whatever reason, Visual Studio cannot see the program at all. Which is in and of itself weird.
So I copied msg.exe to my desktop, added it to source, the program works like a charm now.