Detect on AutoIt a key combination ( ctrl + left arrow ) not from the keyboard but by using a touchpad action

[Syla]

Hi everybody, is there a way to listen from this kind of events ? i already tried with _IsPressed but it does not work at all.

[Jos]

12 minutes ago, Syla said:

_IsPressed but it does not work at all.

So what did you try? Show us the code that isn't working, so we can help.

[Syla]

The code is working when i do the combination on my keyboard, but not by sending it from the driver of my touchpad. So, i don't think so the problem is from my code.

[Jos]

What about you give us the full picture now first, because it's much easier when we know the whole story first!

[Syla]

Opt("MustDeclareVars", True)

If @OSVersion <> "WIN_11" Then Exit MsgBox($MB_SYSTEMMODAL, "", "This script only runs on Win 11")

#Region ;**** Directives created by AutoIt3Wrapper_GUI ****
#AutoIt3Wrapper_Res_HiDpi=Y
#EndRegion ;**** Directives created by AutoIt3Wrapper_GUI ****

If Not (@Compiled ) Then DllCall("User32.dll","bool","SetProcessDPIAware")
Local $Dll = DllOpen("user32.dll")

While 1

    Sleep ( 50 )
    If _IsPressed("11", $Dll) Then
        If _IsPressed("25", $Dll) Then
            ExitLoop
        EndIf
    EndIf

WEnd

DllClose($Dll)

 

[Jos]

Ok... thanks for that part, but this part is still unclear:

18 minutes ago, Syla said:

but not by sending it from the driver of my touchpad.

So how exactly are you simulating this key combination from your touchpad?

[Syla]

Directly on Windows, i just register the action to do.

[Syla]

i use 4 fingers swipe to call ctrl + arrow left

[Syla]

Sorry for my mistake, i think it's the driver who is doing this !

[junkew]

https://www.autoitscript.com/wiki/Tutorial_GUIRegisterMsg

 

[Syla]

Thanks junkew but in my case, there is nothing to do with a gui… am i wrong ? 

[Nine]

Try to hook WH_KEYBOARD_LL with _WinAPI_SetWindowsHookEx (see help file, there is a nice example of it)

ps.  you can also take a look at my Debug Messages Monitor UDF (see my signature for a link to it)

Edited March 13 by Nine

[Syla]

Thanks, I Will Try it 

[junkew]

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/winmsg/about-messages-and-message-queues

The whole windows system is based on messaging. Your swipedevice has a driver that if it nicely behaves transforms your guesture to a sendinput or sendmessage for a keyboardmessage ctrl and left. So you must know which messages the driver is sending and then you have to catche.hook them. An advanced topic where you probably have to read a lot.

[Nine]

@junkew  Sorry to disagree with you, but some messaging passes thru OutputDebugString API messages, not thru standard messages.  I tested a lot with those uncacheable messages and this is the only way.  Asking to GUIRegisterMsg is absolutely not the solution in his case.  Probably the best solution for OP is to hook to  WH_KEYBOARD_LL like I already suggested...

[junkew]

@Nine saying the same but with different wording😀 for sure its in the area of lowlevel messaging and hooking. With the limiterd amount of information how the swipe driver is sending ctrl and left its hard to guess which messages to hook.

[junkew]

https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/win32/blob/docs/desktop-src/wintouch/architectural-overview.md is having WM_TOUCH messages.

Then it depends afterwards what the driver is doing if its a nice driver it uses sendinput for driving the keyboard and/or mouse. (which you then can hook with a keyboard hook)

And not sure where MS is going with WinUI: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/uwp/api/windows.ui.input.preview.injection?view=winrt-26100

[Syla]

Thanks junkew and Nine, i will try all your solutions today and tell you back here.

Edited March 17 by Syla

[Syla]

expandcollapse popup

#include <WinAPI.au3>
#include <WindowsConstants.au3>
HotKeySet('{F3}', '_EXIT')

Dim $hHook, $hFunc, $pFunc

$hFunc = DllCallbackRegister('_KeyboardHook', 'long', 'int;wparam;lparam')
$pFunc = DllCallbackGetPtr($hFunc)

$hHook = _WinAPI_SetWindowsHookEx($WH_KEYBOARD_LL, $pFunc, _WinAPI_GetModuleHandle(0))

While 1
    Sleep(15)
WEnd

Func _EXIT()
    Exit
EndFunc

Func OnAutoItExit()
    _WinAPI_UnhookWindowsHookEx($hHook)
    DllCallbackFree($hFunc)
EndFunc

Func _KeyboardHook($iCode, $iwParam, $ilParam)
    Local $tKHS = DllStructCreate($tagKBDLLHOOKSTRUCT, $ilParam)
    Local $vkCode, $iScanCode

    If $iCode > -1 Then

        $vkCode = DllStructGetData($tKHS, 'vkCode')

        Switch $vkCode
            blah blah blah
        EndSwitch

    EndIf

    Return _WinAPI_CallNextHookEx($hHook, $iCode, $iwParam, $ilParam)
EndFunc

Func _keybd_event($bvkCode, $Flag)
    DllCall('user32.dll', 'int', 'keybd_event', 'byte', $bvkCode, 'byte', 0, 'uint', $Flag, 'ptr', 0)
EndFunc;

Thanks To you both ! It works like a charm 🙂