Get active processname in vc++ - c++

Question

Am working on a background appliation in vc++
How can i get the Process Name of the current Application for example "Iexplore" for Using Internet Explorer, "Skype" for window with tile "Skype - username", "Explorer" for using windows explorer ?
i referred this link but am getting Null error : http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/14843/Finding-module-name-from-the-window-handle

Answer 1

This can be done using the following code:
bool GetActiveProcessName(TCHAR *buffer, DWORD cchLen)
{
HWND fg = GetForegroundWindow();
if (fg)
{
DWORD pid;
GetWindowThreadProcessId(fg, &pid);
HANDLE hProcess = OpenProcess(PROCESS_QUERY_INFORMATION, FALSE, pid);
if (hProcess)
{
BOOL ret = QueryFullProcessImageName(hProcess, 0, buffer, &cchLen);
//here you can trim process name if necessary
CloseHandle(hProcess);
return (ret != FALSE);
}
}
return false;
}
and then
TCHAR buffer[MAX_PATH];
if(GetActiveProcessName(buffer, MAX_PATH))
{
_tprintf(_T("Active process: %s\n"), buffer);
}
else
{
_tprintf(_T("Cannot obtain active process name.\n"));
}
Note though that QueryFullProcessImageName function is only available since Windows Vista, on earlier systems you could use GetProcessImageFileName (it is similar, but requires linkage with psapi.dll and returns device path instead of usual win32 path)

Answer 2

I used this code in my QT5/C++ project to get the currently active process name and window title successfully, based on some research (thanks #dsi). Just wanted to share the code so that someone else would benefit from it.
# Put this two declarations in the top of the CPP file
#include <windows.h>
#pragma comment(lib, "user32.lib")
And put the following into a method:
// get handle of currently active window
HWND hwnd = GetForegroundWindow();
if (hwnd) {
// Get active app name
DWORD maxPath = MAX_PATH;
wchar_t app_path[MAX_PATH];
DWORD pid;
GetWindowThreadProcessId(hwnd, &pid);
HANDLE hProcess = OpenProcess(PROCESS_QUERY_INFORMATION, FALSE, pid);
if (hProcess) {
QueryFullProcessImageName(hProcess, 0, app_path, &maxPath);
// here you can trim process name if necessary
CloseHandle(hProcess);
QString appPath = QString::fromWCharArray(app_path).trimmed();
QFileInfo appFileInfo(appPath);
windowInfo.appName = appFileInfo.fileName();
}
// Get active window title
wchar_t wnd_title[256];
GetWindowText(hwnd, wnd_title, sizeof(wnd_title));
windowInfo.windowTitle = QString::fromWCharArray(wnd_title);
}
This code may not be compiled directly, because windowInfo is a parameter in my program. Please feel free to let me know in case you encountered any issues when trying this code.