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I have to deal with a nasty MS Windows application that quits doing its job as soon as it loses focus. My question is, how can I trick this application somehow to believe that it is still in focus, although it really is not?

My thoughts are:

  1. Is it possible to suppress the corresponding "WM" message from just this application?
  2. Can I send a fake message to this window that it acts like it is in focus?
Kevin
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Xcessity
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    I suppose you could try sending it a `WM_SETFOCUS` message for a quick and dirty solution - if it even works. Otherwise, probably a hook that handles `WM_KILLFOCUS` messages sent to it. Either way, you can't count on the behaviour of the window if you do that. I certainly hope this is for personal use if you want to experiment with things like this. A more promising solution would be to talk with whoever made the other software and ask for an option to continue when the window loses focus. – chris Dec 12 '12 at 16:07
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    Depending on how the application works, you may also need to fake out functions like `GetFocus`. The most reliable way of doing this is simply to run the application in a virtual machine and let it keep focus in the visual machine as long as it likes. – Raymond Chen Dec 12 '12 at 17:22

1 Answers1

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Sending the WM_ACTIVATE message works for some apps: 

 SendMessage(hWnd, WM_ACTIVATE, WA_CLICKACTIVE, hWnd);

Leaving the last parameter as NULL might work too.

ascend4nt
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