Continuously check if a process is running - performance

Question

I have a little code I wrote that checks to see if Outlook is running, and if it is not, opens Outlook. The problem is that my work PC tends to idle around 7% usage, but spikes up to the upper 30s while the script is running. If it detects that Outlook is no longer active, CPU usage can spike up to nearly 100% while opening Outlook. This ~33% increase while the script is running could cause problems when I am working. Is there another way to accomplish the functionality of my code while using less processing power?
do{
$running = Get-Process outlook -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
if (!$running)
{
Start-Process outlook
}
} while (1 -eq 1)

Answer 1

You need to add a Start-Sleep in there, to keep the script from continuously using CPU time. Otherwise it's continuously looping without rest, making sure Outlook is running. At the end of your do-block:
Start-Sleep -s 60
You can adjust the number of seconds, or even specify milliseconds instead with the -m parameter you require it.

Answer 2

Another way of solving this problem is running below batchfile (scheduled)
#echo off
SET outlookpath=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office 15\root\office15\outlook.exe
for /f "usebackq" %%f in (`tasklist /FI "IMAGENAME eq outlook.exe"`) do set a=%%f
REM echo A:%a%
if not "%a%"=="outlook.exe" start "" "%outlookpath%"
If you schedule this to run every 5 minutes, than within 5 minutes after closing outlook, it will start again. If you think 5 minutes is too long, schedule it more often. 😉