I'm trying to create a simple bot in Qt and need therefor a way of simulating keyboard presses OUTSIDE the Qt application itself.
I've successfully made this possible by using the "old" keybd_event
keybd_event(Qt::Key_A,0,0, 0); // Pressing the 'A-button"
and that works out fine. But i can't make it when i'm trying to execute a 'select all' command which needs two buttons to be pressed at once.
As i researched the problem on Google i was refereed to the 'SendInput' function with the message 'This function (keybd_event) has been superseded. Use SendInput instead.'
The problem now is that I've little knowledge of windows API and especially in the contex of "Qt" and would like guidance on how to get started.
keybd_event is actually not Qt function, but part of Windows Api.
Both keybd_event and SendInput allow you to send press event and release event. If you want to send combination ctrl+A you should send events as follows:
press Ctrl -> press A -> release A -> release Ctrl
If you want to use keybd_event, you need to call it 4 times subsequently, if you want to use SendInput, you can make an array of 4 events.
You should use keyboard codes from Windows API to simulate keyboard events, while Qt's codes may coincide with Microsoft's.
Also you should understand that this solution has nothing to do with Qt, it Windows specified.
You just found all links to docs you would need, I think you should start studing it and ask more concrete questions, if you would have any problems.
Related
I am creating a simple C++ console program for fun and I am looking for a way to allow a user to return to a “Main Menu” output at any time if they were to hit a function key like F1 or F2.
Is there anyway I can have my program be at the ready to accept this key at any time or do I need to have a switch statement that can call the “Main Menu” print function everytime the program accepts user input? Is this something that is perhaps out of reach for a console-based program?
EDIT: For now, I am only working on a Windows-based program.
If you are using Windows:
You can use GetKeyState or GetAsyncKeyState, but that won't give you keydown/keyup events. It will only tell you what keys are currently down.
So if you need to get the keydown/keyup events, you could install a hook. A Console window has a window handle that is owned by code in Windows and a message pump, also owned by code in Windows.
You can get the window handle of of the console window by using GetConsoleWindowThen install a WH_CALLWNDPROC hook using SetWindowsHookEx to listen in on messages send to the console window.
You might try a WH_MSGFILTER hook instead. I don't know if this works for console windows, but it would generate less messages to be ignored if it does work.
Alright, I want to write a program that intercepts mouse and keyboard events before they are reported to the active window/application, whatever that may be. Based on my program logic I want to be able to send custom key events.
For example: When the mouse button is held down, for any key press, send the next alphabetical letter. So if I hold down the right mouse button and hit 'a', the application sees it as a 'b' keypress.
I have briefly researched hooks and methods of intercepting WinAPI messages, and I'm unclear as to whether this is the solution I am looking for or not. According to what I've read, some of these solutions require you to inject a DLL into the desired application; my program needs to work for any running application.
Also, I have noticed that most of these solutions are in C#. As a matter of personal preference I would like to use C++ to write this program. Is there any reason why I would need to use C#?
Any pointers or advice is appreciated.
The down arrow key of my laptop is very loose and it does not seems to last very long.
Is it possible to write any programm(in any language but especially C++) hat simulates the down arrow key.say I made a programm such that when I press A,B,C on the key board it simulates down arrow key.
If not then,
Is there any software available to do this?
Use the On-screen keyboard
If you want to simulate input, use the SendInput API. This injects input at a fairly low level, windows automatically routes it to the appropriate thread based on who has focus. Call it twice, once to send the key down, and again to send the key up.
Perhaps the easiest thing to do is to write a simple app that calls RegisterHotkey for some combination like ctrl-alt-Z, and then calls SendInput for a keypress then keyrelease of the down arrow key.
You might need to wait a short time after receiving WM_HOTKEY to give you time to release the set of hotkeys so that the down arrow gets processed alone without those modifiers from your hotkey interfering with it. (...otherwise the focused app might think you typed in shift+alt+downarrow instead of plain downarrow!)
if you're using linux, xmodmap: http://www.xfree86.org/4.2.0/xmodmap.1.html
I think that you are actually looking for Sharpkeys www.randyrants.com/sharpkeys/
This works with the windows registry and can be used to change mappings of keys.
You can easily write a program that sends WM_KEYDOWN and WM_KEYUP messages to the window which has the current focus. Once you have this program, bind it to a function key in the properties for the .exe file.
I am doing a VoIP client and I want to start/stop on WM_KEYDOWN and WM_KEYUP messages for a certain input, say K. When the main window has focus, this is np, but how do I enable it outside of the window? For example, if the window is not in focus and I'm just looking at the desktop or am in a videogame. How does one perform something like this? I am not sure where to begin.
Also -- I guess you somehow has to poll every input even outside the program, is that expensive?
win32 c++ btw
You need to install keyboard hooks: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms644990(v=VS.85).aspx
This can be very troubling though for every running application if something steals its keyboard messages.
I don't think you want this - if I'm typing a document into Word and I hit K, I'm going to be very angry when your application pops up instead of a "k" appearing in my document.
Windows allows you to assign shortcut keys to an icon on the desktop, but it limits them to the function keys or to combinations containing both Alt and Ctrl. Right-click on a desktop icon and go to Properties, and look for the field marked "Shortcut key".
I want to create an application. This application has to do something when a user presses special keys on keyboard or/and uses scroll wheel. This application is a service. It has no windows. I want to catch any keyboard or mouse events which were designed with other applications.
For example, you are watching TV by 3rd party application. If you press Ctrl + Shift and use scroll wheel my application changes the volume.
I use Windows 7 x64 and Visual Studio 2008.
You can call SetWindowsHookEx() to be notified when various events occur. You probably want to use the keyboard hook and the mouse hook to watch for mouse events.
If your application is a true Win32 service, then on Vista and beyond, the application won't receive keyboard or mouse events - to close a security hole (search for "shatter attack"), Microsoft isolated all services to prevent them from interacting with the user.
You'll need to have your application run in the session with the interactively logged on user.
You can use the RAW INPUT method, It is more reliable than GetAsyncKeyState etc.
I wrote this article on Code Project that may be of use to you.
There is both C# and a MASM source code versions available.