VB.NET SendMessage() KeyStrokes.

[abhishek009]

Hi,

I have opened the NotePad and I want to send key strokes using SendMessage. I have got parent and child window and tried to send keystrokes using SendMessage() but didn't work. Why ? As far as I know the code is correct.

 Const WM_KEYDOWN As Integer = &H100
        Const WM_KEYUP As Int32 = &H101
        Const VK_RETURN As Integer = &HD

        Dim hWnd_notepad As IntPtr = FindWindow(Nothing, "Untitled - Notepad")
        Dim hWnd_notepad_class As IntPtr = FindWindowEx(hWnd_notepad, Nothing, "Edit", Nothing)


        SendMessage(hWnd_notepad_class, WM_KEYDOWN, VK_RETURN, 0)
        SendMessage(hWnd_notepad_class, WM_KEYUP, VK_RETURN, 0) 

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks!

[joe31623]

Does the following help?
http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...ton-on-notepad

[Edgemeal]

Hi,

I have opened the NotePad and I want to send key strokes using SendMessage. I have got parent and child window and tried to send keystrokes using SendMessage() but didn't work. Why ? As far as I know the code is correct.

FWIW, Testing on Win7 & 10 only here.
That code works in 7 but not in 10, tried using PostMessage instead and it works on both OS.

[abhishek009]

Actually I'm trying on the web browser control. I have a text box or text view on the control and want to send keystroke to it. PostMessage worked for NotePad. I have got the handler for the Web Browser control. Focused on the text element but it didn't send the text. Can you check if it's working for web browser too ?

Thanks !

P.S : I don't want to use SendKeys or HTML method to set the text.

[Edgemeal]

P.S : I don't want to use SendKeys or HTML method to set the text.

Quick test using html file (called SpellCheck) that is just a textbox and nothing else and this worked on Chrome browser, I never had any luck using APIs like this on browsers tho. You might want to try using UIAutomation, IIRC that can send stuff to browser elements. Good Luck!

Dim hWnd As IntPtr = FindWindow("Chrome_WidgetWin_1", "SpellCheck - Google Chrome")
If hWnd <> IntPtr.Zero Then
    Dim HwndEdit As IntPtr = FindWindowEx(hWnd, IntPtr.Zero, "Chrome_RenderWidgetHostHWND", "Chrome Legacy Window")
    If HwndEdit <> IntPtr.Zero Then
        SetForegroundWindow(hWnd) ' bring chrome to foreground
        ' send return key
        PostMessage(HwndEdit, WM_KEYDOWN, VK_RETURN, 0) 
        PostMessage(HwndEdit, WM_KEYUP, VK_RETURN, 0)
    Else
        MessageBox.Show("'Chrome_RenderWidgetHostHWND' not found!")
    End If
Else
    MessageBox.Show("'Chrome_WidgetWin_1' not found!")
End If

[abhishek009]

Thank you for your help. I have never heard of UIAutomation. Can you give me the link and documentation ? I searched on google but no luck.

Thanks again!