VB Console Background Screen Color

[C0der]

Hello everyone,

im looking for a way to change the bgcolor of a VB console color to blue.
this is a small example, but i only know how to change the text color.

Sub Console()
cInit
cTitle "Console"
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Hello everyone" & vbCrLf
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cColor 9
cPrint "Hello Again!" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Press Enter to Exit"
cTerminate
End Sub

Some option colors:

Public Sub cColor(Optional ByVal intForeColor As Integer, _
Optional ByVal intBackColor As Integer)
'Manually set colors using the SetTextAttribute function.

If IsNull(intForeColor) Then
'User left blank [OK]
Else
Select Case intForeColor

Case 0
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, 0

Case 1
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_RED

Case 2
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 3
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_BLUE

Case 4
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_RED Or _
FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 5
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_RED Or _
FOREGROUND_BLUE

Case 6
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_GREEN Or _
FOREGROUND_BLUE
       
Case 7
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_RED _
Or FOREGROUND_BLUE Or FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 8
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY

Case 9
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_RED
        
Case 10
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 11
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_BLUE

Case 12
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_RED Or FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 13
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_RED Or FOREGROUND_BLUE

Case 14
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_BLUE Or FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case 15
SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_INTENSITY _
Or FOREGROUND_RED Or FOREGROUND_BLUE Or FOREGROUND_GREEN

Case Else
cPrint "Error: " & intForeColor & " is not a valid color."
End Select
End If
End Sub

can someone tell me how?
i will appreciate any help i can get.

Thanks

[LaVolpe]

Look at your source and see if you have any BACKGROUND_RED, _GREEN, _BLUE, _INTENSITY constants. The background colors are those constants and they are sent along with the foreground values using OR.

Since I have it, I'll pass you the constants... The reverse constant below swaps foreground/background colors.

Private Const BACKGROUND_BLUE As Long = &H10
Private Const BACKGROUND_GREEN As Long = &H20
Private Const BACKGROUND_INTENSITY As Long = &H80
Private Const BACKGROUND_RED As Long = &H40
Private Const COMMON_LVB_REVERSE_VIDEO As Long = &H4000

[C0der]

Thank you LaVolpe, can i ask you how to use it?
yeah, how to add it to my code, like i did with this:

Sub Console()
cInit
cTitle "Console"
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Hello everyone" & vbCrLf
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cColor 9
cPrint "Hello Again!" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Press Enter to Exit"
cTerminate
End Sub

[baja_yu]

SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_BLUE Or BACKGROUND_RED

[C0der]

Hi baja_yu,

you know whats the thing? ...i think i am not doing right.
i get errors, i would like to know how i can add the code.

Like in this example:

Sub Console()
cInit
cTitle "Console"
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Hello everyone" & vbCrLf
cPrint "" & vbCrLf
cColor 9
cPrint "Hello Again!" & vbCrLf
cPrint "Press Enter to Exit"
cTerminate
End Sub

This is part of the same bas where the rest of the colors code are.

[LaVolpe]

You'd have to validate this. Using bit shifting, you can have 1 easy function.

Private Sub SetConsoleColors(Optional ForeColor As ColorConstants = vbWhite, _
                          Optional BackColor As ColorConstants = vbBlack, _
                          Optional ForeHighIntensity As Boolean = False, _
                          Optional BackHighIntensity As Boolean = False) 

     Dim lColor As Integer
     lColor = ((BackColor And &H100000) \ &H10000) Or _
             ((BackColor And &H2000) \ &H100) Or _
             (BackColor And &H40) Or Abs(BackHighIntensity) * &H80 Or _
             ((ForeColor And &H10000) \ &H10000) Or _
             ((ForeColor And &H200) \ &H100) Or _
             (ForeColor And &H4) Or Abs(ForeHighIntensity) * &H8

     SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, lColor

End Sub

sample call...... SetConsoleColors vbYellow, vbBlue

Edited: Changed Long to Integer in the lColor declaration above. Per the MSDN reference the console attribute is of type: WORD

[C0der]

I added it to my bas but it doesn't do nothing.

[LaVolpe]

Doesn't do anything? Surely it does . Whether it does what you intended or not is another question.

Take this line in your sample code from post #1 above: cColor 9
And replace it with: SetConsoleColors vbYellow, vbBlue

If you have a valid hConsoleOut window, I'd think the color should change?

Edited: Oh, change lColor from Long to Integer. I just noticed the parameter per MSDN is Word not DWord
That is very likely why no color changes occurred. Value of zero was being interpretted which keeps default white/black colors.

[C0der]

LaVolpe:

Doesn't do anything? Surely it does .
Whether it does what you intended or not is another question.

what am i intended to do? ...
My first question (#1) explains well what i really want,
and what i really want is to turn the whole console bg blue.

to be honest, your example code didn't work for me.

I try this other example:

 SetConsoleTextAttribute hConsoleOut, FOREGROUND_RED Or FOREGROUND_INTENSITY Or BACKGROUND_BLUE

but it doesn't turn the bg blue, it does, but only for the area of the text.

[LaVolpe]

...but it doesn't turn the bg blue, it does, but only for the area of the text.

Gotcha; the entire window background color should be blue or whatever color you want. Sorry, don't know the answer.

[C0der]

Is OK, it's not your fault, i think there's no way to do this.

Thank you anyway

[AsmIscool]

Give this a try. It sounds like it may be what you are after.

[C0der]

Thank you AsmIscool,
but this example does not coordinate with my project,
my project is about VB Console, something like DOS.

[dilettante]

I generally send people here for these sorts of questions:

http://vb.mvps.org/samples/Console/

Karl's sample project is quite a dumpster-load of code and API calls, but he has probably provided a way to do what you want here. If nothing else perhaps you can find the parts you actually need in his code, extract them, and clean them up. Or you might just use it as-is.

[C0der]

Hi dilettante,
WoW, i am impressed with the code in this page, very nice,
some how it doesn't have no explanation of the whole bg color. :-(

[dilettante]

Yes I agree. He has a lot of stuff in there, but to dig out any single feature to use it yourself you have to follow the trail of breadcrumbs. In this case look at what happens in his BackColor property.

[C0der]

Hi dilettante,
hey sorry for what happend in the other post,
i really didn't realise what i was talking about.

and once again thank you for the page you suggested,
i will live this question open till someone come with an easy solution,
is just that i wanted to make this project as simple as posible.

[dilettante]

No problem, I don't get too worried about that sort of thing.

If you root through Karl's code you may find he uses one API call to set those colors though. I just haven't looked at it in a long time.