Need help with SendMessage / GETTEXT

I've been trying a couple of different code samples found on the web. I must say I havn't been playing with SendMessage a lot but I was able to use it for some basic needs (exemple: a dialog box asking you to load a file: I can populate a new path and click "OK" to browse to it).

My question is concerning such a DIALOG BOX. Like I said I can make it browse to a given path. NOW I want to use GETTEXT to see in which path I currently am.

I am trying the following piece of code:

Code:

---

        hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndPOPUP, 0&, "WorkerW", vbNullString)
        hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "ReBarWindow32", vbNullString)
        hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "Address Band Root", vbNullString)
        hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "msctls_progress32", vbNullString)
        hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "ComboBoxEx32", vbNullString)
       
        Dim strToolbarText As String
        Dim txtLen As Long
        txtLen = SendMessage(hwndCONTROL, WM_GETTEXTLENGTH, ByVal 0, ByVal 0)
        SendMessage hwndCONTROL, WM_GETTEXT, ByVal (txtLen + 1), ByVal StrPtr(strToolbarText)

---

... hwndPOPUP contains the right hwnd for the dialog window that has appeared. The couple of FindWindowEx lines brings me down to the hwnd of ComboBoxEx32, which is the dropdown I'm interested into. The hwndCONTROL is correctly populated all the way. The GETTEXTLENGTH does return a value of "30", which is the exact length of the string I am interested in retrieving (confirmed by using "Window Detective").

The problem is that the next line, "GETTEXT", returns "" in my strToolBarText variable. I'm near.... but can't find what the problem is! This is a dialog box appearing from IE.

Any tips? Thank you guys!!

Krass

It has been a while since I've done this kind of thing, but I'm pretty sure you need to make sure the string is already big enough to hold the text, eg:

Code:

---

txtLen = ...
strToolbarText = Space(txtLen)
SendMessage ...

---

Hello si_the_geek, I think you were right on this. But it is still behaving weirdly.

In my initial post, I was trying to retrieve the path, to make sure I am in the right folder (with my images I want to upload). In the meantime, I noticed I could skip this step by sending (SETTEXT) my path, by adding "\"1.jpg" "2.jpg"" at the end. Pressing 'OK' would just start uploading the pictures so my problem was solved.

So now I am trying to do exactly the same, but with the ADDRESS bar of an IE. The GETTEXTLENGTH is good, but it returns something weird like this:
"??????????????????????????????????l

































"
I notice the length is good, and that the last letter, in this case "l", is the address last letter.

Any other suggestions? Here is what "Window Detective" shows me:
Attachment 141779

Here's the code I am using (which is quite exactly the same as my first post - I do get hwnd successfully on each call, but retrieving the edit-text doesn't work)...

Code:

---

    Dim strToolbarText As String
    Dim txtLen As Long
   
    ShellExecute 0&, vbNullString, "www.google.com", vbNullString, vbNullString, vbMaximizedFocus
    Call proWaitWithSleep(2000)

    hwndBROWSER = FindWindowEx(0&, 0&, "IEFrame", vbNullString)
   
    hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndBROWSER, 0&, "WorkerW", vbNullString)
    hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "ReBarWindow32", vbNullString)
    hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "Address Band Root", vbNullString)
    hwndCONTROL = FindWindowEx(hwndCONTROL, 0&, "Edit", vbNullString)
   
    txtLen = SendMessage(hwndCONTROL, WM_GETTEXTLENGTH, ByVal 0, ByVal 0)
    strToolbarText = String$(txtLen, vbNullChar)
    SendMessage hwndCONTROL, WM_GETTEXT, ByVal (txtLen + 1), ByVal StrPtr(strToolbarText)
   
    MsgBox strToolbarText

---

It gives me that "?????????????l " weird string.
...any tips greatly appreciated!

Krass

i assume this indicates that the caption is in unicode

you may need to sendmessageW
an example here http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...o-SendMessageW