How to get the hwnd of an app....

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  19 years ago

  by Glow

  Glow

  , United States

  Joined 19 years ago

  Hi all,
  

  
  I got a problem with my prog. It starts an Application via the Shell function. Then, if u click another button in my prog it should do something with the started prog. For example:
  

  
  1. U click button1 on my prog. It starts Notepad.exe via Shell("notepad.exe"),vbnormalfocus. Now the notepad app has the focus.
  2. u change back to my prog, and click button2. It now should send some text to notepad using the Sendkeys function.
  

  
  There is the prob. If i start Notepad via the Shell function, and later wants to send some text with another button, it cant find notepad. So i think i should use the hwnd function to get the hwnd of notepad. Then i should be able to send some text. But how should i do that ? I have tried some things, but nothing works
  And how can i make my prog always stay on top so it dont minimize if i change to another app ?
  I hope anybody can help me with this prob.
  If u got more questions about my prob please ask. And if u have an working solution 4 it, I´ll be very happy
  

  
  Glow

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  19 years ago

  by Jonathan Price

  Jonathan Price

  , United States

  Joined 20 years ago

  The following code is kindly provided by an excelent resourse called www.vbapi.com. It lists loads of API calls for windoze and is a great site. In order to "find" the hWnd of a window, you need to know it's title (in the blue bar at the top). This function returns the hWnd so you can use the "SendKeys" function on it.
  

  
  Regards,
  

  
  Jonathan
  

  
  ' This code is licensed according to the terms and conditions listed here.
  

  
  ' Declarations and such needed for the example:
  ' (Copy them to the (declarations) section of a module.)
  Public Declare Function FindWindow Lib "user32.dll" Alias "FindWindowA" (ByVal lpClassName As String, _
     ByVal lpWindowName As String) As Long
  Public Declare Function FlashWindow Lib "user32.dll" (ByVal hWnd As Long, ByVal bInvert As Long) As Long
  Public Declare Sub Sleep Lib "kernel32.dll" (ByVal dwMilliseconds As Long)
  

  
  ' * Place the following code inside a form. *
  

  
  Private Sub cmdFind_Click()
     Dim hWnd As Long    ' receives handle to the found window
     Dim retval As Long  ' generic return value
     
     ' Attempt to locate a window titled Minesweeper.
     hWnd = FindWindow(vbNullString, "Minesweeper")
     If hWnd = 0 Then
         Debug.Print "Minesweeper is not currently running."
     Else
         ' Flash the window's title bar on and off once. Or use your sendkeys function.
         retval = FlashWindow(hWnd, 1)
         Sleep 500  ' pause for half a second
         retval = FlashWindow(hWnd, 0)
     End If
  End Sub
  

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  19 years ago

  by James Crowley

  James Crowley

  London, United Kingdom

  Joined 20 years ago

  Jonathan ... we now have some new code for links etc, so that HTML code doesn't muck up the forum layout....
  See here for more information....

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  19 years ago

  by Glow

  Glow

  , United States

  Joined 19 years ago

  Hi
  

  
  I got it to work. But I used another way. First I used the FindWindow code. then I used BringWindowToTop to give the app the focus. Now i can easily send the text to notepad
  But thx 4 ur help
  

  
  Glow

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