>is there a windows API telling me if a certain word document is open ?
>
>Peter

You may check this Problem with closing Excel opened by automation Thread #1232734 recent thread where I was dealing with a similar problem, though for Excel.

I also discussed it in another forum and found, that if you have a reference to your Excel (word) object, the simplest way to bring it to front, is to set its WindowState to maximize.

#define xlMaximized -4137  
  #define xlMinimized -4140  
  #define xlNormal -4143  
    
  loExcel.WindowState = xlMaximized

Idea by Vladimir Maximov in http://forum.foxclub.ru/read.php?29,278870,page=2 and http://forum.foxclub.ru/read.php?32,177182,258927#msg-258927 (in Russian)