C#: capture windowstate changes of another application (wrote in c/c++ i think)

Question

I have a situation where I need to capture windowstate changes of another window (which is not owned by my application and I didn't wrote it. I think it's written in C++).

Actually I'm using a separate thread where I constantly do GetWindowState and fire custom events when this value changes (I have the handle of the window), but I would like to know if there is a better method

Thanks,

P.S. I'm using winform if can be useful in any way

murktinez · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-17T06:14:32.997

2

//use this in a timer or hook the window
//this would be the easier way
using System;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

public static class WindowState
{
    [DllImport("user32")]
    private static extern int IsWindowEnabled(int hWnd);

    [DllImport("user32")]
    private static extern int IsWindowVisible(int hWnd);

    [DllImport("user32")]
    private static extern int IsZoomed(int hWnd);

    [DllImport("user32")]
    private static extern int IsIconic(int hWnd);

    public static bool IsMaximized(int hWnd) 
    {
        if (IsZoomed(hWnd) == 0)
            return false;
        else
            return true;
    }

    public static bool IsMinimized(int hWnd)
    {
        if (IsIconic(hWnd) == 0)
            return false;
        else
            return true;
    }

    public static bool IsEnabled(int hWnd)
    {
        if (IsWindowEnabled(hWnd) == 0)
            return false;
        else
            return true;
    }

    public static bool IsVisible(int hWnd)
    {
        if (IsWindowVisible(hWnd) == 0)
            return false;
        else
            return true;
    }

}

edited Jun 17 '11 at 06:14

answered Jun 17 '11 at 06:03

murktinez

36
2

of course this assumes you know how to obtain the window's handle. if you don't just read a tutorial on the Win32 API. particularly, the FindWindow and FindWindowEx functions. An API spy would be useful as well. check our patorjk.com, they have a good API spy for free. – murktinez Jun 17 '11 at 06:10
I don't see the point here, I asked how to **capture** windowstate changes, not how to check it which is far easier – Francesco Belladonna Jun 17 '11 at 12:54
If you use this class in a timer, saving the window state everytime the timer executes then you will know when the window state has changed. It's very simple. If you are trying to prevent a window's state very being changed thats something different, and something you would need to be more clear about. I could provide code to do that as well – murktinez Jun 18 '11 at 05:29
I'm doing it in this way at the moment, maybe this is the best solution if you don't wanna do **a lot** of work – Francesco Belladonna Jun 18 '11 at 09:12

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 17 '11 at 01:01

1

You can hook WNDPROC and intercept messages with that. You can either inject a DLL into the target process, open the process with debug priveleges or set a global hook to WH_CALLWNDPROC.

answered Jun 17 '11 at 01:01

foxy

7,599
2
30
34

Neither of which you can do with C#. – Hans Passant Jun 17 '11 at 01:11
Well it's not a problem if I have to write something with C++, the problem, however I think is too complex for such a tool I'm trying to develop... – Francesco Belladonna Jun 17 '11 at 03:02
1

@Hans , you can use interop (p/invokes) to achieve such a thing with C#. – foxy Jun 17 '11 at 05:33

C#: capture windowstate changes of another application (wrote in c/c++ i think)

2 Answers2

Linked