How to close windows on screen keyboard with c++

Question

I'm trying to close windows on-screen keyboard (osk.exe) in c++ code, but without any success.

HWND kbIsOpen = FindWindow(TEXT("OSKMainClass"),NULL);
CloseWindow(kbIsOpen);

CloseWindow or SendMessage didn't to anything. Note that the problem is not in kbIsOpen, and also getLastError returns 5 (ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED).

What I can do to deal with this problem?

You might aswell kill the process, which would be more appropriate I guess. — Havenard, Mar 10 '14 at 19:50
*CloseWindow function: Minimizes (but does not destroy) the specified window.* — chris, Mar 10 '14 at 19:51
Windows API call would only send close window event to the application but the application can reject this — Steve, Mar 10 '14 at 19:51
Also, see that with User Access Control activated you may need to elevate your application's privilege to do that. — Havenard, Mar 10 '14 at 19:51
If you can get by with hiding the window instead of completely killing the application give `ShowWindow` a try. — Captain Obvlious, Mar 10 '14 at 19:59
So, is there any way of closing Osk.exe without elevation? I haven't found any. — Aros, Dec 02 '20 at 15:41

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 10 '14 at 19:58

Assuming FindWindow returns a valid window handle, SendMessage(kbIsOpen, WM_DESTROY, NULL, NULL); should close it. (Although it's kind of a dangerous way to do it. Try sending WM_CLOSE and WM_QUIT first.)

However, it's possible that the keyboard window throws away destroy messages, and just keeps on going no matter what you throw at it. I'm running Windows 7, so I can't tell you myself.

< unimportant opinion > bkIsOpen sounds like the name of a boolean variable telling you if the window is open, not a handle to the window if it exists. < /unimportant opinion >

How to close windows on screen keyboard with c++

1 Answers1