Making an application with semi-transparent window and "transparent input"

Question

I want to make an application with transparent window. I want to put one picture at the background of this window and make window transparent for inputs (i.e. if I click at window, it will be same as if I click there at screen if there is no this application). I want to make input box at application startup for input alpha. Is it possible to make an application like this one in c#? If yes, what is the best way to do this?

This is something you can likely do on any platform, in any programming language, as it's something provided by the Operating System rather than a specific platform. You should pick your platform first and then look how to do that on that platform (and ask if you don't find anything on Google) — Pekka, Mar 01 '15 at 18:52
@Pekka웃. I know how to make window transparent on some platforms. Problem is how to make "transparent input", i.e. if I click somewhere on my application, system will behave like this application is not running, it will be the same if I clicked on that place on screen if there is no my application. If it can be done on any platform, I will choose C#, but I do not have an idea how to do this. — , Mar 01 '15 at 19:22
Ah, OK. Then I think you should edit your question's title, and add the tags for your preferred platform — Pekka, Mar 01 '15 at 19:27
Seems related to this (although it uses WinForms, not WPF) http://stackoverflow.com/q/855826/103167 — Ben Voigt, Mar 01 '15 at 20:46
Also read this: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/nickkramer/archive/2005/06/24/432517.aspx — Ben Voigt, Mar 01 '15 at 20:47
@BenVoigt. Thank you, I almost succeeded, but I still have one problem. When I click on my application, it move behind other windows. How to make my application to be always in front of other applications? — , Mar 01 '15 at 21:25
You mean you clicked past your application, within its rectangle but not within its non-rectangular area? And the window that received the mouse click came to the front? I suggest you make your window "topmost". The Win32 way uses `SetWindowPos`, but WinForms has a Topmost property and WPF probably has something also. — Ben Voigt, Mar 01 '15 at 21:54

Utsav Dawn · Answer 1 · 2015-03-01T20:43:28.147

1

You can create a transparent window by the below XAML code in a WPF application. You can vary the opacity values between 0 and 1 to get the desired transparency. To get full transparency use 0.

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication3.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525"
        AllowsTransparency="True" WindowStyle="None" IsActive="False">
    <Window.Background>
        <SolidColorBrush Opacity="0.5" Color="White"/>
    </Window.Background>
    <Grid>
        <TextBox Width="200" Height="50"/>
    </Grid>
</Window>

edited Mar 01 '15 at 20:43

answered Mar 01 '15 at 19:04

Utsav Dawn

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I know this, but this is not exactly what I asked. What about "transparent input"? – Mar 01 '15 at 19:54
You want a transparent textbox? – Utsav Dawn Mar 01 '15 at 19:56
No, i want "transparent input", i.e. if I click somewhere on my application, system will behave like this application is not running, it will be the same if I clicked on that place on screen if there is no my application. – Mar 01 '15 at 19:59
What is the relation between transparent input and " if I click somewhere on my application, system will behave like this application is not running, it will be the same if I clicked on that place on screen if there is no my application."? I am not getting you. How do you want to take an input? – Utsav Dawn Mar 01 '15 at 20:03
I want to make application with following features: 1. Window of that application must be semi-transparent 2. If I click on window of my application, system would behave like I clicked on that place on screen, like my application is not runing. For example, if I play some game and I run my application, I would see semi-transparent window of my application over game window. Also, I could play game absolutelly normal, like my application is not running (that includes if I click on my application, system will behave like I clicked on game window). – Mar 01 '15 at 20:17
For that you have to make the IsActive property of the window to be false. I have updated the answer check it. – Utsav Dawn Mar 01 '15 at 20:44

Making an application with semi-transparent window and "transparent input"

1 Answers1