Get the Last Active Window

[fisofo]

I have a button on a gui that performs an action on a window IF it is the "next" active window. However, I seem to be having tons of trouble finding out what the last active window was... the window that was active before I clicked on my GUI.

any ideas on a way to do this efficiently?

[SmOke_N]

I have a button on a gui that performs an action on a window IF it is the "next" active window. However, I seem to be having tons of trouble finding out what the last active window was... the window that was active before I clicked on my GUI.

any ideas on a way to do this efficiently?

Well since you've provided no trial and error on your part, here's something for you to look at rather than me sitting down to figure it out myself.

http://www.autoitscript.com/forum/index.ph...t+active+window

[fisofo]

Well since you've provided no trial and error on your part, here's something for you to look at rather than me sitting down to figure it out myself.

http://www.autoitscript.com/forum/index.ph...t+active+window

well i feel like a moron... i guess i misspelled something in my hasty search cause i didn't get many good hits...

thanks.

[fisofo]

Okay, I think i'm getting somewhere, but I have a general question on dll calls:

On this page, there's a description of the GetWindow function, and I figured out the dll call from someone else's post:

$Response = DLLCall("user32.dll", "HWnd", "GetWindow", "HWnd", $HWnd, "Int", 2)

What I want to know is, how do you figure out that the "Int" for GW_HWNDNEXT is 2?!? Everything else makes sense, but if I want to make my own dll calls, i really need to figure that part out

thanks.

Edited January 1, 2007 by fisofo

[Richard Robertson]

If you know the preprocessor directive, search the MSDN for it. You should get a table of values somewhere including that value. If you have Visual C++ or Visual Studio, just make a new C++ project and type GW_HWNDNEXT, put your mouse over it, and see what it is defined as. I keep an extra project around called testing just to find values and test very small pieces of code.

[fisofo]

If you know the preprocessor directive, search the MSDN for it. You should get a table of values somewhere including that value. If you have Visual C++ or Visual Studio, just make a new C++ project and type GW_HWNDNEXT, put your mouse over it, and see what it is defined as. I keep an extra project around called testing just to find values and test very small pieces of code.

Sorry for my noobishness on this, but... "preprocessor directive" ??? Ya lost me on that one

I don't have either apps you listed, closest thing would be Visual Basic for office apps, but I know that won't have it.

I did do a search for GW_HWNDNEXT on msdn and I get a ton of hits, but it doesn't appear any of them have the table you mention... could you give me an example? Perhaps that would clear it up a bit for me.

thanks for the help.

[Richard Robertson]

You can download Visual C++ 2005 Express for free, if you feel like learning or just messing around. At least, you can download if you have a valid Windows key.

Well, no I cannot find you an example table because I have always had to dig myself when trying to find things that I could not have Visual Studio find for me.

I found GW_HWNDNEXT in winuser.h which is a header file as part of the Windows platform SDK.

Edit: Preprocessor directives are C++ things that you write as

#define GW_HWNDNEXT 2

and then you can use GW_HWNDNEXT which is similar to a constant. The difference between a preprocessor directive and a constant is that the preprocessor will replace everywhere you put GW_HWNDNEXT with a 2 instead of having a static value wasting a couple bytes of RAM.

Edited January 1, 2007 by Mr Icekirby

[fisofo]

You can download Visual C++ 2005 Express for free, if you feel like learning or just messing around. At least, you can download if you have a valid Windows key.

Well, no I cannot find you an example table because I have always had to dig myself when trying to find things that I could not have Visual Studio find for me.

I found GW_HWNDNEXT in winuser.h which is a header file as part of the Windows platform SDK. Do you dabble in C++?

it's valid, no worries there that may be the best option, thanks for the tip...

I took programming classes in college a few years back (C, Java, blah blah... wtf, scheme?!?) but never did C++ (CompEng degree). Header files are typically easy though, i just need to get access to it.

Anywho, I just saw This Link, so that will probably be my next step. Anything else that might be helpful to me?

thanks for the pointers!

edit: this could prove useful as well

Edited January 1, 2007 by fisofo

[Richard Robertson]

I may be using old header files. I am still using Visual Studio 2002 for C++. I'm thinking of upgrading to 2005 soon though. I only downloaded C# 2005 so far.

"This Link" is for Windows Vista, which is not what you want yet, I don't think. The second link could be helpful to you, but some of us already have it.

[fisofo]

I may be using old header files. I am still using Visual Studio 2002 for C++. I'm thinking of upgrading to 2005 soon though. I only downloaded C# 2005 so far.

"This Link" is for Windows Vista, which is not what you want yet, I don't think. The second link could be helpful to you, but some of us already have it.

yup, you're right on that being vista, i'll have to find the old one...

anyway, sounds good. thanks again.