How to implement Global Hotkeys in C#?

Question

I need to write an application which globally intercepts Alt+Shift+S.

What I did is I created a DLL which sets global hooks:

namespace Hotkeydll
{
    public class MyHotKey
    {
        public static void setHooks()
        {
            KeyboardHookProcedure = new HookProc(KeyboardHookProc);
            hKeyboardHook = SetWindowsHookEx(WH_KEYBOARD_LL, KeyboardHookProcedure, Marshal.GetHINSTANCE(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().GetModules()[0]), 0);
        }

        private int KeyboardHookProc(int nCode, Int32 wParam, IntPtr lParam)
        {
            //write something into file
        }


   }
}

Then I created a program which loads this DLL and set the hook:

using Hotkeydll;
namespace IWFHotkeyStarter
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            MyHotKey.setHooks();
        }
    }
}

Now the problem is that the hotkey doesn't work.

It looks like the DLL is not loaded permanently into memory. I see that I can delete the dll file from file system.

So please advise what I am doing wrong?

Should I use a different approach?

Thank you.

What does your PInvoke code look like for `SetWindowsHookEx` — SwDevMan81, Dec 10 '10 at 16:37
This might be helpful http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cs/globalhook.aspx — fardjad, Dec 10 '10 at 17:53

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Dec 10 '10 at 18:41

Your Main() method sets the hooks, then immediately exits and terminates the program. Furthermore, you need a message loop to make the hook callback work. That requires a Windows Forms or WPF app. Using a real hot key instead of a hook now also becomes an option. Check this thread for an example, C# is further down the page.

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 10 '10 at 18:48

0

Keyboard hooks are usually not the right way to get global hotkeys.

Use RegisterHotkey whenever possible.

answered Dec 10 '10 at 18:48

CodesInChaos

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@Paedow That's the windows API. You'll need to use a fitting p/invoke method, but that's not hard. – CodesInChaos Oct 23 '12 at 06:38
It´s justz the thing that I am not so good at this because I´ve never learned – LostPhysx Oct 23 '12 at 13:46

How to implement Global Hotkeys in C#?

2 Answers2