ShellExecuteEx or HlinkSimpleNavigateToString

Question

I want to launch a web page in the default browser from my Win32 application. Both functions do the job. Is there any reason to use one or the other?

Answer 1

ShellExecuteEx seems to be the preferred/recommended way of opening something, whether it's a file or webpage. ShellExecuteEx seems to be a more general purpose solution for opening any type of item using it's default handler. I always use ShellExecuteEx, and have never had a need to use HlinkSimpleNavigateToString.