KeyDown map to GUI form button downstate - vb6

Question

Hi I would like to ask if it's possible to map the KeyDown for keyboards in Visual Basic 6 to turn the state of a graphical Command Button on the form to the "Down State" while keyboard key is pressed then back to raised when released? Thanks

Answer 1

I am aware of the problem here, because I did somewhat similar in the past and ended up by using an array of PictureBoxes instead of graphical CommandButtons.
Anyway, a simple workaround with CommandButtons is to keep the focus away by adding to the Form another control which can act as focus target. Remember: when a Form goes activated, it will place the focus to the first focusable control inside itself.
As You haven't specified in Your question what kind of keyboard state You need, below is a simple example with the a s d f keys. You will need less than 5 minutes to get it up and running.
Step 0:
Copy and paste following declarations to Your VB Form:
Option Explicit
Option Base 0
Const BM_SETSTATE = &HF3
Private Declare Function PostMessage Lib "user32" Alias "PostMessageA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Long, ByVal lParam As Long) As Long
Dim Target(254) As Long
Step 1:
Add to Your Form an array of CommandButtons called, for instance, Button(0), Button(1), Button(2), Button(3) and so on.
Set the properties which You need (Picture, DownPicture, etc.) and set also:
TabStop: False
Double-click one of this CommandButtons. You can see, You have just one entry point for the whole array of Controls. Choose GotFocus from the event drop-down and put this piece of code:
Private Sub Button_GotFocus(Index As Integer)
PicFocus.SetFocus
End Sub
Step 2:
On Your VB Form, set this property:
KeyPreview: True
Double-click the Form, choose Load from the event drop-down and set Your desired mapping between a KeyCode and the corresponding CommandButton:
Private Sub Form_Load()
Target(65) = Button(0).hwnd ' 65: KeyCode for "a"
Target(83) = Button(1).hwnd ' 83: KeyCode for "s"
Target(68) = Button(2).hwnd ' 68: KeyCode for "d"
Target(70) = Button(3).hwnd ' 70: KeyCode for "f"
End Sub
Choose KeyDown and KeyUp from the event drop-down and put inside the two global keyboard event handlers this piece of code - respectively -1 for the down-state and 0 for the up-state:
Private Sub Form_KeyDown(KeyCode As Integer, Shift As Integer)
' Debug.Print KeyCode
Call PostMessage(Target(KeyCode), BM_SETSTATE, -1&, 0&)
End Sub
Private Sub Form_KeyUp(KeyCode As Integer, Shift As Integer)
Call PostMessage(Target(KeyCode), BM_SETSTATE, 0&, 0&)
End Sub
Step 3:
Lastly, add to the same VB Form the PictureBox mentioned above and set following properties:
Name: PicFocus
Appearance: 0-Flat
BorderStyle: 0-None
HasDC: False
TabIndex: 0
TabStop: False
Width: 255
Left: -1000
Press Ctrl+F5 and test if this is what You need.

Answer 2

The CommandButton control has mouse and keyboard down and up events:
Private Sub Command1_Click()
Debug.Print "click"
End Sub
Private Sub Command1_KeyDown(KeyCode As Integer, Shift As Integer)
Debug.Print "keydown"
End Sub
Private Sub Command1_KeyUp(KeyCode As Integer, Shift As Integer)
Debug.Print "keyup"
End Sub
Private Sub Command1_MouseDown(Button As Integer, Shift As Integer, X As Single, Y As Single)
Debug.Print "mousedown"
End Sub
Private Sub Command1_MouseUp(Button As Integer, Shift As Integer, X As Single, Y As Single)
Debug.Print "mouseup"
End Sub