I have a third party application which I did not create myself. I need to create an application which is able to listen for button clicks and read data from tables in that application. I believe that the third party application is made in C# but I do not know for sure. Is there a way to know when UI buttons are pressed and to harvest data from the application? I do not mind which programming language the solution must be written in, as long as it fulfils the above tasks.
You can use few dlls like user32.dll, to get data from other apps.
Find parent handle of a window:
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
static extern IntPtr FindWindow(string lpClassName, string lpWindowName);
public static IntPtr FindWindow(string windowName)
{
var hWnd = FindWindow(windowName, null);
return hWnd;
}
After that, find handle of a child window
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
public static extern IntPtr FindWindowEx(IntPtr parentHandle, IntPtr childAfter, string className, string windowTitle);
private IntPtr FindSomeElement(IntPtr parent)
{
IntPtr childHandle;
childHandle = FindWindowEx(
parent,
IntPtr.Zero,
"WindowsForms10.EDIT.app21",
IntPtr.Zero);
return childHandle;}
and get text from it:
private static string GetText(IntPtr childHandle)
{
const uint WM_GETTEXTLENGTH = 0x000E;
const uint WM_GETTEXT = 0x000D;
var length = (int)SendMessage(handle, WM_GETTEXTLENGTH, IntPtr.Zero, null);
var sb = new StringBuilder(length + 1);
SendMessage(handle, WM_GETTEXT, (IntPtr)sb.Capacity, sb);
return sb.ToString();
}
//I didnt test this code, just gave an idea.
Visit www.pinvoke.net/default.aspx/ for more information. You can find alot about user32.dll
Related
I have simple helper method which allows me to open notepad.exe and fill it by provided text.
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
public static extern IntPtr FindWindowEx(IntPtr hwndParent, IntPtr hwndChildAfter, string lpszClass, string lpszWindow);
[DllImport("user32.dll", EntryPoint = "SendMessageW")]
public static extern IntPtr SendMessageW(IntPtr hWnd, UInt32 msg, IntPtr wParam, [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)] string lParam);
public static void OpenNotepadWithText(string text)
{
var process = Process.Start("notepad.exe");
if (process == null)
throw new Exception("Unable to run notepad.exe process!");
process.WaitForInputIdle();
IntPtr child = FindWindowEx(process.MainWindowHandle, new IntPtr(0), "Edit", null);
SendMessageW(child, 0x000C, IntPtr.Zero, text);
}
When I click on close button of notepad, notepad is closed without asking for save. It seems that used approach does not set "need_to_save" flag in notepad and thus notepad thinks that there is no changed content to save. Can someone help me with setting this flag?
The title says it all, I have this code:
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
static extern IntPtr FindWindow(string lpClassName, string lpWindowName);
[DllImport("user32.dll", EntryPoint = "FindWindow", SetLastError = true)]
static extern IntPtr FindWindowByCaption(IntPtr ZeroOnly, string lpWindowName);
[DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
static extern IntPtr SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd, UInt32 Msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam);
const UInt32 WM_CLOSE = 0x0010;
and here's what I added to Form1_Load:
IntPtr windowPtr = FindWindowByCaption(IntPtr.Zero, "Untitled - Notepad");
if (windowPtr == IntPtr.Zero)
{
MessageBox.Show("Window not found");
return;
}
SendMessage(windowPtr, WM_CLOSE, IntPtr.Zero, IntPtr.Zero);
so I added the code above to the Form1_Load function, and it actually works, it closes notepad when I open my program, but my question is, how to make the function repeat, like close notepad whenever it opens and not only on Form1_Load ?
You have to enumerate the windows yourself: EnumWindows and in the return procedure check if the title is the same as what you want (hardcoding 'Untitled' might not be the best way by the way). Alternatively traverse the window graph yourself with GetWindow, starting at the first desktop child and iterate the siblings from there.
Also you don't need the IntPtr version of FindWindow, you can pass null as a string parameter and it accomplishes the same.
How can I programatically find the handle of a user control in a webpage running on IE?
I'm able to find it using Spy++ but since the handle keeps changing I'm stuck.
I've been trying using FindWindow() but no luck :( I also wonder if I am doing something wrong or it simply only work for Windows...
Thanks in advance,
Zubrowka
I had a similar problem finding a PDF ActiveX Control inside a IE control in WPF.
To overcome the problem I used the EnumChildWindows API to find the correct child window and thus get its handle.
I'll include as much code as I can.
private static IntPtr FindPdfControlWindow(IntPtr parentHandle)
{
IntPtr result = IntPtr.Zero;
IntPtr matchPointer = IntPtr.Zero;
try
{
//allocate unmanaged memory for the result of the callback delegate
matchPointer = Marshal.AllocHGlobal(Marshal.SizeOf(typeof(IntPtr)));
Marshal.WriteIntPtr(matchPointer, IntPtr.Zero)
//instantiate the delegate and pass to the API
NativeMethods.EnumWindowProc windowChecker = CheckForPdfControlWindow;
if (!NativeMethods.EnumChildWindows(parentHandle,
windowChecker,
matchPointer))
}
finally
{
if (matchPointer != IntPtr.Zero) Marshal.FreeHGlobal(matchPointer);
}
return result;
}
private static bool CheckForPdfControlWindow(IntPtr handle,
IntPtr matchPointer)
{
int captionLength = NativeMehtods.GetWindowTextLength(handle);
if (captionLength > 0)
{
StringBuilder buffer = new StringBuilder(captionLength + 1);
NativeMethods.GetWindowText(handle, buffer, buffer.Capacity);
if (buffer.ToString().Contains("Adobe"))
{
Marhsal.WriteIntPtr(matchPointer, handle)
return false;
}
}
return true;
}
private static class NativeMethods
{
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
[return: MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
internal static extern bool EnumChildWindows(IntPtr window,
EnumWindowProc callback,
IntPtr i);
internal delegate bool EnumWindowProc(IntPtr hWnd, IntPtr parameter);
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSer.Auto)]
internal static extern int GetWindowTextLength(IntPtr hWnd);
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]
internal static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd,
StringBuilder lpString,
int nMaxCount);
}
transcribed in a rush so I hope it is both helpful and accurate.
If the ActiveX control is windowed, then you can query its IOleWindow interface to get the window handle.
Before you query interfaces from the ActiveX, you need to review the page's HTML to find a way to identify the activex in the document, such as element id.
By using this code I can get the title of the active window..
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern IntPtr GetForegroundWindow();
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
static extern int GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder text, int count);
private string GetActiveWindowTitle()
{
const int nChars = 256;
IntPtr handle = IntPtr.Zero;
StringBuilder Buff = new StringBuilder(nChars);
handle = GetForegroundWindow();
if (GetWindowText(handle, Buff, nChars) > 0)
{
return Buff.ToString();
}
return null;
But how should I do to get the classname of the active window?
Simply pinvoke GetClassName(). This returns the Windows class name for a window, it doesn't have anything to do with a C# class. Getting the C# class name for a window in another process is not possible. Take a look at the Managed Spy++ tool for possible hacks if this is a Winforms app.
I expanded Hans Passant's answer into working code:
Usage:
string className = Spy.GetForegroundWindowClassName();
Class:
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Text;
public static class Spy
{
[DllImport("user32.dll")]
private static extern IntPtr GetForegroundWindow();
[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]
private static extern int GetClassName(IntPtr hWnd, StringBuilder lpClassName, int nMaxCount);
public static string GetForegroundWindowClassName()
{
IntPtr hWnd = GetForegroundWindow();
var className = new StringBuilder(256);
GetClassName(hWnd, className, className.Capacity);
return className.ToString();
}
}
Side Note: in my case, I just needed a basic utility to tell me the class name of a window so I could reference that in my C# code. After writing the code above, I realized I could achieve the same thing using pre-existing utilities. One such utility I see mentioned often in the C# community is Visual Studio's Spy++ tool. I didn't bother trying that since it requires downloading 2.5 GB of C++ components. Instead, I used the "Window Spy" tool that comes with Autohotkey. Autohotkey is a tiny download compared to what's needed for Spy++, so I think it's a good option if it suits your needs.
In a previous question, I asked how to send text to Notepad. It helped me immensely. For part 2, here's a simplified version of the same applied mIRC:
[DllImport("User32.dll", EntryPoint = "FindWindow")]
public static extern IntPtr FindWindow(String lpClassName, String lpWindowName);
[DllImport("user32.dll", EntryPoint = "FindWindowEx")]
public static extern IntPtr FindWindowEx(IntPtr hwndParent, IntPtr hwndChildAfter, string lpszClass, string lpszWindow);
[DllImport("User32.dll")]
public static extern int SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd, int uMsg, int wParam, string lParam);
IntPtr mainHandle = FindWindow("mIRC", null);
IntPtr serverHandle = FindWindowEx(mainHandle, new IntPtr(0), "MDIClient", null);
IntPtr chanHandle = FindWindowEx(serverHandle, new IntPtr(0), "mIRC_Channel", null);
IntPtr editHandle = FindWindowEx(chanHandle, new IntPtr(0), "Edit", null);
SendMessage(editHandle, 0x000C, 0, textBox1.Text);
This seems correct to me, except that it doesn't work! Is it that the window names are incorrect (MDIClient, mIRC_Channel, and Edit)? These are values I found on a web site by googling "FindWindowEx mIRC".
1.) What am I doing wrong in the above?
2.) For reference, in general is there an easy way to find all the Window names for use with FindWindowEx()?
This code works for me (mirc 6.31):
IntPtr mainHandle = FindWindow("mIRC", null);
IntPtr serverHandle = FindWindowEx(mainHandle, new IntPtr(0), "MDIClient", null);
IntPtr chanHandle = FindWindowEx(serverHandle, new IntPtr(0), "mIRC_Channel", null);
IntPtr editHandle = FindWindowEx(chanHandle, new IntPtr(0), "richEdit20A", null);
SendMessage(editHandle, 0x000C, 0, "Hello World");
Notice the changed window class (richedit20A instead of edit). Just found the correct class by using Spy++.
As for the window handles, one possibility is to use the EnumWindows or EnumChildWindows API.