In Visual C#, I'm trying to take text from multiple textboxes (one at a time) and paste them into Notepad. I do this by copying to the clipboard, alt-tabbing, and then pasting into notepad...then again for the other textboxes. This code represents this idea:
subBox1.SelectAll();
subBox1.Copy();
SendKeys.Send("%{TAB}"); // alt+tab
SendKeys.Send("^v"); // paste
SendKeys.Send("{TAB}"); // tab
subBox2.SelectAll();
subBox2.Copy();
SendKeys.Send("^v");
SendKeys.Send("{TAB}");
subBox3.SelectAll();
subBox3.Copy();
SendKeys.Send("^v");
SendKeys.Send("{TAB}");
As you can see, this copies and pastes from three textboxes (named subBox1, 2, and 3). But, for some reason, only the last textbox's contents are getting copied over. This also happens if I comment out the third box...in that case, only the second textbox's content gets copied over. I've tried using the SelectAll() and Copy() as you see here, as well as the Clipboard class. Both have the same issue.
For example, if the textbox contents are "asdf", "qwer", and "zxcv" respectively, all I see is "zxcv" three times.
Any idea why this is happening? I've been stuck on this for about an hour now and have no idea what's going on.
Thanks a ton!
SendKeys doesn't wait for the other application to process the keys you send, so by the time notepad gets around to processing your keypresses, your program has already copied subBox3's text over the top of the other texts.
You need to use SendWait instead.
As well, instead of sending Alt+Tab, you could use something like this:
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
static extern IntPtr FindWindow(string lpClassName, string lpWindowName);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
[return: MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
static extern bool SetForegroundWindow(IntPtr hWnd);
// ...
SetForegroundWindow(FindWindow(null, "Untitled - Notepad"));
I'd use SendMessage for more accurate results. To use SendMessage, you first need a valid window handle to the text area of Notepad. This can be done in a variety of ways, but I prefer just using my simple child lookup function.
You will need the following namespace imports and PInvoke declarations:
using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Text;
//pinvoke
[DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
private static extern IntPtr SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd, UInt32 Msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
[return:MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
private static extern bool GetClassName(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder lpClassName, int nMaxCount);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern int GetWindowTextLength(IntPtr hWnd);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
[return:MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
private static extern bool EnumChildWindows(IntPtr hParent, delChildWndProc callback, IntPtr lpParam);
//delegate callback for EnumChildWindows:
[return:MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
private delegate bool delChildWndProc(IntPtr hWnd, IntPtr lParam);
Now, onto the child window lookup. Basically works similar to FindWindowEx, but I wanted to write my own, and it retrieves multiple windows which can be nice. It uses the following wrapper class to describe information between calls:
private class WindowLookup
{
public string LookupName { get; private set; }
public List<IntPtr> MatchedChildren { get; private set; }
public int Depth { get; set; }
public int MaxDepth { get; set; }
public WindowLookup(string lookup, int maxdepth)
{
this.MatchedChildren = new List<IntPtr>();
this.LookupName = lookup;
this.MaxDepth = maxdepth;
if (this.MaxDepth > 0)
this.MaxDepth++; //account for the depth past the parent control.
this.Depth = 0;
}
}
And then the following functions do all the work:
private static List<IntPtr> FindAllWindows(IntPtr hParent, string className, int maxdepth = 0)
{
var lookup = new WindowLookup(className, maxdepth);
var gcAlloc = GCHandle.Alloc(lookup);
try
{
LookupChildProc(hParent, GCHandle.ToIntPtr(gcAlloc));
}
finally
{
if (gcAlloc.IsAllocated)
gcAlloc.Free();
}
return lookup.MatchedChildren;
}
private static bool LookupChildProc(IntPtr hChild, IntPtr lParam)
{
var handle = GCHandle.FromIntPtr(lParam);
WindowLookup lookup = null;
if (handle.IsAllocated && (lookup = handle.Target as WindowLookup) != null)
{
if (lookup.Depth < lookup.MaxDepth || lookup.MaxDepth == 0)
{
lookup.Depth++;
var builder = new StringBuilder(256);
if (GetClassName(hChild, builder, builder.Capacity) && builder.ToString().ToLower() == lookup.LookupName.ToLower())
lookup.MatchedChildren.Add(hChild);
EnumChildWindows(hChild, LookupChildProc, lParam);
}
}
return true;
}
You don't need to worry about the implementation of these functions too much, they'll work as-is. The key thing is that using these functions, you can find the handle to notepad's Edit window (the text area you type in) very easily.
var notepads = Process.GetProcessesByName("notepad");
if (notepads.Length > 0)
{
foreach(var notepad in notepads) //iterate through all the running notepad processes. Of course, you can filter this by processId or whatever.
{
foreach(var edit in FindAllWindows(notepad.MainWindowHandle, "Edit"))
{
//next part of the code will go here, read on.
}
}
}
Now, where I left the code was in the middle of a loop through the "Edit" windows of each notepad process running at the time. Now that we have a valid window handle, we can use SendMessage to send stuff to it. In particular, appending text. I wrote the following function to handle appending text to a remote control:
private static void AppendWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, string text)
{
if (hWnd != IntPtr.Zero)
{
//for your reference, 0x0E (WM_GETTEXTLENGTH), 0xB1 (EM_SETSEL), 0xC2 (EM_REPLACESEL)
int len = SendMessage(hWnd, 0x000E, IntPtr.Zero, IntPtr.Zero).ToInt32();
var unmanaged = Marshal.StringToHGlobalAuto(text);
SendMessage(hWnd, 0x00B1, new IntPtr(len), new IntPtr(len));
SendMessage(hWnd, 0x00C2, IntPtr.Zero, unmanaged);
Marshal.FreeHGlobal(unmanaged);
}
}
Now that we have our AppendWindowText function, you can add a function call to it in the nested loop above (where I put the comment):
AppendWindowText(edit, "Some text here");
And there you have it. It's a bit of a wordy response, but in the end this method is far more reliable than using SendKeys and focusing the window etc. You never need to lose focus of your own application.
If you have any questions, feel free to comment and I'll answer as best I can.
Cheers,
J
EDIT: Some references:
SendMessage function (MSDN)
EnumChildWindows function (MSDN)
Appending text using SendMessage
Related
Sorry if this is a vague question, it's a very specific case and difficult to explain. Here's what I'm trying to do (this is for a 64 bit Windows application by the way)
Look to see if a particular save file dialog window is open inside an application (image of it below, it's a dialog box that pops up inside of the application when exporting something)
Once I have a pointer to that window, somehow access and use its elements in such a way that I'm able to name the file I'm saving, navigate to a desired file path, then save it, all through code
Here's a photo of the window that I'm trying to control through code (for reference)
Image
So far I've been able to find code that gives me all the active windows, including the one I'm targeting. Here is that code:
using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using HWND = System.IntPtr;
using System.Text;
/// <summary>Contains functionality to get all the open windows.</summary>
public static class OpenWindowGetter
{
/// <summary>Returns a dictionary that contains the handle and title of all the open windows.</summary>
/// <returns>A dictionary that contains the handle and title of all the open windows.</returns>
public static IDictionary<HWND, string> GetOpenWindows()
{
HWND shellWindow = GetShellWindow();
Dictionary<HWND, string> windows = new Dictionary<HWND, string>();
EnumWindows(delegate (HWND hWnd, int lParam)
{
if (hWnd == shellWindow) return true;
if (!IsWindowVisible(hWnd)) return true;
int length = GetWindowTextLength(hWnd);
if (length == 0) return true;
StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder(length);
GetWindowText(hWnd, builder, length + 1);
windows[hWnd] = builder.ToString();
return true;
}, 0);
return windows;
}
private delegate bool EnumWindowsProc(HWND hWnd, int lParam);
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern bool EnumWindows(EnumWindowsProc enumFunc, int lParam);
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern int GetWindowText(HWND hWnd, StringBuilder lpString, int nMaxCount);
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern int GetWindowTextLength(HWND hWnd);
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern bool IsWindowVisible(HWND hWnd);
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern IntPtr GetShellWindow();
}
namespace ConsoleApp1
{
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
foreach (KeyValuePair<IntPtr, string> window in OpenWindowGetter.GetOpenWindows())
{
IntPtr handle = window.Key;
string title = window.Value;
Console.WriteLine("{0}: {1}", handle, title);
}
}
}
}
I'm not sure what to do from here. What I need now help with now is checking for the particular window I'm targeting (named Export Selection as seen in the photo).. then somehow get references to its components and control them.
I've looked into using Spy++ to get info about the components, and then using FindWindowEx and SendMessage to control them. This is not something I completely understand, as I'm limited in my C# knowledge. Is this the correct approach, and if so how would I go about doing it?
Yea, using Spy++ is a good approach to understand that application and its controls. As you seem already to be able to detect the correct window, the next step is now to use the SendMessage function to send data to the individual controls of the window. Look up in the Win32 API documentation to find the correct messages to send. I.e. you would use the WM_SETTEXT message to put text into the "File name" input box. See here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/win32/winmsg/wm-settext.
Or you use the SetWindowText function, which basically does the same, but is easier to use. You already have the prototype for the GetWindowText method declared in your code. The C# declaration for SetWindowText should be
[DllImport("USER32.DLL")]
private static extern int SetWindowText(HWND hWnd, String lpString);
In Visual Studio I've created a Word 2016 Document project. To this document I've added a custom ActionsPane control. The only thing this control does is adding a PlainTextContentControl to the active document.
if (Globals.ThisDocument.Content.Application.ActiveDocument == null) return;
var tagControl = Globals.ThisDocument.Controls.AddPlainTextContentControl(Guid.NewGuid().ToString());
tagControl.PlaceholderText = #"PLACEHOLDER";
tagControl.LockContents = true;
This all works fine, the plaintextcontrol is added and selected in the Word document. But what I want is that the control is added and that the cursor will jump to the end of the control so a user can directly start typing. The newly added control is automatically selected. How can I turn this of?
I have already tried:
var range = Globals.ThisDocument.Content;
range.Application.Selection.Collapse();
Can anyone help me out here? Thanks.
Edit:
Als tried this solution.
private static IntPtr documentHandle;
public delegate bool EnumChildProc(IntPtr hwnd, int lParam);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
public static extern System.IntPtr SetFocus(System.IntPtr hWnd);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
public static extern int EnumChildWindows(IntPtr hWndParent, EnumChildProc callback, int lParam);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
public static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder title, int count);
private static bool EnumChildWindow_Handle(IntPtr handle, int lparam)
{
StringBuilder s = new StringBuilder(50);
GetWindowText(handle, s, 50);
Debug.WriteLine(s.ToString());
if (s.ToString() == "Microsoft Word-document")
{
documentHandle = handle;
}
return true;
}
private void MoveCursorToEndOfLastAddedTag(PlainTextContentControl ctrl)
{
EnumChildProc EnumChildWindow = new EnumChildProc(EnumChildWindow_Handle);
EnumChildWindows(Process.GetCurrentProcess().MainWindowHandle, EnumChildWindow, 0);
SetFocus(documentHandle);
}
This also doesn't work.
Finally I have success. It's not the most clean way, but it works like a charm. The only code I made is this:
private void MoveCursorToEndOfLastAddedTag(PlainTextContentControl ctrl)
{
System.Windows.Forms.SendKeys.Send("{F10}");
System.Windows.Forms.SendKeys.Send("{F10}");
System.Windows.Forms.SendKeys.Send("{RIGHT}");
}
It sends 2 times the F10 key. First time the focus is set to the ribbon, the second time the focus is given back to the document. With the right key I remove the selection from the PlainTextContentControl.
Thank you all for your help.
I'm interested in working on a plugin for Keepass, the open-source password manager. Right now, Keepass currently detects what password to copy/paste for you based off of the window title. This prevents Keepass from detecting the current password you need for apps that don't actively update their window title based on the current site (Chrome for instance).
How can I walk through another processes window elements (buttons, labels, textbox) similar to how Spy++ works? When you run Spy++ you can hover over other programs windows and get all kinds of information about various properties concerning various controls (labels, textboxes, etc). Ideally, I'd like my Keepass plugin to enhance the current window detection by walking through the active window's elements in an effort to find a matching account to copy/paste the password.
How can I walk other processes window elements and be able to retrieve label and textbox values using C#?
I've being answering similar questions like this here: How can I detect if a thread has windows handles?. Like it states, the main idea is to enumerate through process windows and their child windows using EnumWindows and EnumChildWindows API calls to get window handles and then call GetWindowText or SendDlgItemMessage with WM_GETTEXT to get window text. I've modified code to make an example which should be doing what you need (sorry it's a bit long :). It iterates through processes and their windows and dumps window text into console.
static void Main(string[] args)
{
foreach (Process procesInfo in Process.GetProcesses())
{
Console.WriteLine("process {0} {1:x}", procesInfo.ProcessName, procesInfo.Id);
foreach (ProcessThread threadInfo in procesInfo.Threads)
{
// uncomment to dump thread handles
//Console.WriteLine("\tthread {0:x}", threadInfo.Id);
IntPtr[] windows = GetWindowHandlesForThread(threadInfo.Id);
if (windows != null && windows.Length > 0)
foreach (IntPtr hWnd in windows)
Console.WriteLine("\twindow {0:x} text:{1} caption:{2}",
hWnd.ToInt32(), GetText(hWnd), GetEditText(hWnd));
}
}
Console.ReadLine();
}
private static IntPtr[] GetWindowHandlesForThread(int threadHandle)
{
_results.Clear();
EnumWindows(WindowEnum, threadHandle);
return _results.ToArray();
}
// enum windows
private delegate int EnumWindowsProc(IntPtr hwnd, int lParam);
[DllImport("user32.Dll")]
private static extern int EnumWindows(EnumWindowsProc x, int y);
[DllImport("user32")]
private static extern bool EnumChildWindows(IntPtr window, EnumWindowsProc callback, int lParam);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
public static extern int GetWindowThreadProcessId(IntPtr handle, out int processId);
private static List<IntPtr> _results = new List<IntPtr>();
private static int WindowEnum(IntPtr hWnd, int lParam)
{
int processID = 0;
int threadID = GetWindowThreadProcessId(hWnd, out processID);
if (threadID == lParam)
{
_results.Add(hWnd);
EnumChildWindows(hWnd, WindowEnum, threadID);
}
return 1;
}
// get window text
[DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto, SetLastError = true)]
static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder lpString, int nMaxCount);
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
static extern int GetWindowTextLength(IntPtr hWnd);
private static string GetText(IntPtr hWnd)
{
int length = GetWindowTextLength(hWnd);
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder(length + 1);
GetWindowText(hWnd, sb, sb.Capacity);
return sb.ToString();
}
// get richedit text
public const int GWL_ID = -12;
public const int WM_GETTEXT = 0x000D;
[DllImport("User32.dll")]
public static extern int GetWindowLong(IntPtr hWnd, int index);
[DllImport("User32.dll")]
public static extern IntPtr SendDlgItemMessage(IntPtr hWnd, int IDDlgItem, int uMsg, int nMaxCount, StringBuilder lpString);
[DllImport("User32.dll")]
public static extern IntPtr GetParent(IntPtr hWnd);
private static StringBuilder GetEditText(IntPtr hWnd)
{
Int32 dwID = GetWindowLong(hWnd, GWL_ID);
IntPtr hWndParent = GetParent(hWnd);
StringBuilder title = new StringBuilder(128);
SendDlgItemMessage(hWndParent, dwID, WM_GETTEXT, 128, title);
return title;
}
hope this helps, regards
Have a look at this article here which contains information about the Managed Spy and why the author wrote the tool.
You can use EnumWindows to find every top-level Chrome window and then call EnumChildWindows recursively (see Jeroen Wiert Pluimers' comment) to get every child of the main window. Alternatively, once you have the main Chrome window, you can use GetWindow to manually navigate the tree since you probably know what you're looking for (3rd child's children collection or something similar).
Once you find your window, you can use SendMessage with a WM_GETTEXT parameter to read the window's label.
You can use HWndSpy. Source code is here.
For the functionality of pointing to a window. You need to SetCapture() so that you get mouse messages that are outside of your window. Then use WindowFromPoint() to convert a mouse position to a Window. You will need to convert the moust position from client coordinates to window coordinates first.
If you try an call SetCapture() anywhere but on a mouse click message, you will probably be ignored. This is the reason that Spy++ makes you click on an Icon and drag and drop it on the window you want to point to.
I have an application which i want to run in the background. I want to get the executable name, for an example IExplorer.exe. I have played around with the following code:
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern IntPtr GetForegroundWindow();
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder text, int count);
public static void Main()
{
int chars = 256;
StringBuilder buff = new StringBuilder(chars);
while (true)
{
// Obtain the handle of the active window.
IntPtr handle = GetForegroundWindow();
// Update the controls.
if (GetWindowText(handle, buff, chars) > 0)
{
Console.WriteLine(buff.ToString());
Console.WriteLine(handle.ToString());
}
Thread.Sleep(1000);
}
}
That only gets me the Window title, and the handle ID. I want to get the executable name (and maybe more information).
How do i achieve that?
I think you want "GetWindowModuleFileName()" instead of GetWindowText
You pass in the hwnd, so you'll still need the call to GetForegroundWindow()
A quick google search brings up an example such as C-Sharpcorner article
I'm creating a small utility in C#, that will add some text to an active textbox when a global hotkey is pressed, it's a type of auto complete function. I have my global hotkey working, but now I don't know how to get the current text in the active textbox (if the active window is a textbox that is.) What I've tried so far is to use
a. GetForegroundWindow and then using that handle calling GetWindowText. This gave me the window title of the active window, not the textbox contents.
b. GetActiveWindow and using that handle to call GetWindowText. That gives me no text at all.
Here's an example of what I've done
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern bool UnregisterHotKey(IntPtr hWnd, int id);
[ DllImport("user32.dll") ]
static extern int GetForegroundWindow();
[ DllImport("user32.dll") ]
static extern int GetWindowText(int hWnd, StringBuilder text, int count);
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern int GetActiveWindow();
public static void TestA() {
int h = GetForegroundWindow();
StringBuilder b = new StringBuilder();
GetWindowText(h, b, 256);
MessageBox.Show(b.ToString());
}
public static void TestB() {
int h = GetActiveWindow();
StringBuilder b = new StringBuilder();
GetWindowText(h, b, 256);
MessageBox.Show(b.ToString());
}
So, any ideas on how to achieve this?
Edit 28.01.2009:
So, I found out how to do this. This is what I used:
using System;
using System.Text;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
public class Example
{
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern int GetFocus();
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern bool AttachThreadInput(uint idAttach, uint idAttachTo, bool fAttach);
[DllImport("kernel32.dll")]
static extern uint GetCurrentThreadId();
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern uint GetWindowThreadProcessId(int hWnd, int ProcessId);
[DllImport("user32.dll") ]
static extern int GetForegroundWindow();
[DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto, SetLastError = false)]
static extern int SendMessage(int hWnd, int Msg, int wParam, StringBuilder lParam);
const int WM_SETTEXT = 12;
const int WM_GETTEXT = 13;
public static void Main()
{
//Wait 5 seconds to give us a chance to give focus to some edit window,
//notepad for example
System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(5000);
StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder(500);
int foregroundWindowHandle = GetForegroundWindow();
uint remoteThreadId = GetWindowThreadProcessId(foregroundWindowHandle, 0);
uint currentThreadId = GetCurrentThreadId();
//AttachTrheadInput is needed so we can get the handle of a focused window in another app
AttachThreadInput(remoteThreadId, currentThreadId, true);
//Get the handle of a focused window
int focused = GetFocus();
//Now detach since we got the focused handle
AttachThreadInput(remoteThreadId, currentThreadId, false);
//Get the text from the active window into the stringbuilder
SendMessage(focused, WM_GETTEXT, builder.Capacity, builder);
Console.WriteLine("Text in active window was " + builder);
builder.Append(" Extra text");
//Change the text in the active window
SendMessage(focused, WM_SETTEXT, 0, builder);
Console.ReadKey();
}
}
Some notes about this. The example waits for 5 seconds before doing anything, giving you the chance to give focus to some edit window. In my real app I'm using a hotkey to trigger this, but that would just confuse this example. Also, in production code you should check the return values of the win32 calls to see if they succeeded or not.
It's reasonable to send keystrokes if you aware of active window and focused input field. See http://www.pinvoke.net/default.aspx/user32/keybd_event.html for API.
Please check, even em_replacesel message may not work across different process, You might need to use WM_COPYDATA or by calling window procedure as given in the url,
http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?dg=microsoft.public.smartphone.developer&tid=4e3a9289-9355-4af7-a5b9-84f1aa601441&cat=&lang=&cr=&sloc=en-us&p=1