Switch focus/activate another Application after opening it-CodePudding

I added an "Edit with Photoshop" button and succeeded opening Photoshop with a file using this code:

Type PhotoshopType = Type.GetTypeFromProgID("Photoshop.Application");
object PhotoshopInst = Activator.CreateInstance(PhotoshopType);                    
PhotoshopType.InvokeMember("Open", BindingFlags.InvokeMethod, null, PhotoshopInst, new object[1] { "c:\files\image.jpg" });

But I am failing to activate (give focus to) Photoshop so the user does not have to switch manually. Any idea on how to accomplish it?

CodePudding user response：

This is typically a use-case for the

Where the "localized control type" is "window" and the ClassName" is "Photoshop".

CodePudding user response：

This type of work requires using the Win32 API that has lots of low level APIs to work with Windows.

http://www.pinvoke.net/ is the best place to look up examples of these API's.

Also the Help Manual with Visual Studio 6 has a Win32.chm.

Here is a link to the VS2008 documentation (2.2GB) and it has 99% of the win32 API info: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=20955&751be11f-ede8-5a0c-058c-2ee190a24fa6=True

Set Active Window

https://www.pinvoke.net/default.aspx/user32.setactivewindow

C# Signature:

[DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError=true)]
public static extern IntPtr SetActiveWindow(IntPtr hWnd);

Method:

public void MakeFormActive()
{
    SetActiveWindow(wndHandle);
}

Alternatively use this method that I found on MSDN https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/vstudio/en-US/c53bcda9-2a77-4af3-b0e2-3ea77deadcee/get-hwnd-from-activator-dreated-com-object?forum=clr

using Microsoft.Win32;
using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Linq;
using System.Reflection;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Security;
[SuppressUnmanagedCodeSecurity, SecurityCritical, DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Auto, ExactSpelling = true)]
private static extern bool ShowWindowAsync(HandleRef hWnd, int nCmdShow);
private const int SW_SHOWNORMAL = 0x1;
private const int SW_SHOWMINIMIZED = 0x2;
private const int SW_SHOWMAXIMIZED = 0x3;

static void Main(string[] args) {

    string appName = "Photoshop.Application";
    Type PhotoshopType = Type.GetTypeFromProgID(appName);
    object PhotoshopInst  = Activator.CreateInstance(applicationType);
    applicationType.InvokeMember("Visible", BindingFlags.IgnoreCase | BindingFlags.SetProperty | BindingFlags.Public, null, excelApplication, new object[]{true});

    try
    {
            var process = (from p in Process.GetProcessesByName(appName) // Double check appName is correct
                         where p.MainWindowHandle != null
                         orderby p.Id
                         select p).LastOrDefault();
            if(process != null)
                ShowWindowAsync(new HandleRef(null, process.MainWindowHandle), SW_SHOWMAXIMIZED);

    } finally {
        Console.WriteLine("Press any key to exit.");
        Console.ReadKey(true);
        applicationType.InvokeMember("Quit", BindingFlags.IgnoreCase | BindingFlags.OptionalParamBinding | BindingFlags.InvokeMethod | BindingFlags.Public, null, excelApplication, new object[0]);

    }
}