In Windows 7, I'm looking for a quick way to see if a certain application is running or not. (The specifics of the application don't matter - it could be Notepad or Internet Explorer, for example.)
I have the application icon pinned to my task bar, so one solution would be if the colour of the icon changed when the application was running. However, there may be other ways - any noticeable change to the Windows GUI which doesn't require clicking or typing will do.
Do you have any suggestions?
EDIT: A bit more context: I'm a software developer who frequently runs a build script. The script happens to fail if a certain application is open. Sometimes I forget to check if the application is open; then I have to close the application and re-run the script.