On Windows with Python subprocess, an executable may be missing DLL from PATH. This environment error can be detected and a message given to the user.

The return code of the subprocess can be checked for the error code 3221225781, which corresponds to hex error code C0000135.

import subprocess
import os
import logging

ret = subprocess.run('myprog.exe')

if ret.returncode == 3221225781 and os.name == 'nt':
    # Windows 0xc0000135, missing DLL
    logging.error('missing DLL detected. Ensure DLL directory is in environment variable PATH')
    path = os.environ['PATH']
    print("PATH:", path)
    raise SystemExit(ret.returncode)

If putting DLLs on PATH is problematic, another possible approach is statically compiling the executable, but this may not be feasible for all programs.