Read image behind current window - winapi

In Win32 or Direct2D, is it possible to read the screen that would be under the window that is being drawn? (in OnPaint() or wherever) Is it necessary to generate the screen data in back of the current window's rectangle and blit it into a memory buffer, and is this possible?

Related

Can we avoid WM_PAINT when using ScrollWindow in win32?

I am new to win32 programming and have a very naive question.
Say there is my application window of size 1920x1280 and I create a child window over it of size 1920x2560 (double of vertical screen size). Now I load an image onto this child window which has the same size as that of child window i.e 1920x2560.
Now my question is If I use ScrollWindow for vertical scroll, will I necessarily need to repaint the dirty rect (the bottom part), since the image would be already loaded? Is it not possible to avoid that and just move the screen buffers ? Or is there any other way possible to avoid redrawing, may be using bitmaps or something?
An application draws in a window when scrolling, changing, or
selecting a portion of the displayed
data
but you could only draw the differences in the Update Region.
It's also noted that disabling the default handling for the WM_ERASEBKGND message makes smooth.
The disadvantage of your idea is always drawing outside of client area and how to just move the screen buffers to avoid redrawing?

Resizing another threads window with MFC above screen size

I use the handle of a window from another process to resize and reposition it from an MFC based app. The handle comes from a window search for Title.
Repositioning works fine, resizing too - if not larger then the screen resolution.
But that's the problem - I want it to be bigger then the actual screen.
Even if set partially outside the visible screen area with negative coordinates in SetWindowPos it does not scale above the values returned by GetSystemMetrics(SM_CXSCREEN) and GetSystemMetrics(SM_CYSCREEN)
Any ideas or hints?

Resizing Layered Windows

I'm hoping I can get away with communicating the issue I'm having clearly without posting a ton of source code. The source is all ASM and while most would understand it, it's still not their primary "thing."
I have a layered window which is working perfectly - up to the point of resizing it. The window is all per-pixel alpha. There are no transparent pixels. The borders and caption are opaque (255 alpha); the client area is something like 128 alpha or whatever I put it at. So no transparent pixels.
I have a function that handles redraws - it's actually geared toward rebuilding the frame for a new window size. GetWindowDC is called on the layered window. CreateCompatibleDC creates off of that DC. The bitmap is a DIB section. The bitmap is properly sent to UpdateLayeredWindow. Again, everything works perfectly as long as the window is not in active resize (border drag).
I have tried using DefWindowProc to handle border drags, as well as completely handling all aspects of that functionality myself. The results are the same: massive flicker but ONLY beyond the window boundaries that existed before border drag began, and then the window size does not ultimately change - sort of. The original window area remains displayed without issue. No flicker there. However if (for example) I'm dragging the right border to the right, everything right of the original window right edge flickers rapidly then vanishes. When I release the left mouse button, the display remains at the original size (the size the window was before dragging the border). I've verified the bitmap is correctly rebuilt to the new size. It seems like the DC for the layered window doesn't want to resize because the entire area of original window size is completely stable, but any new area appearing post-resize flickers then hides.
I've even tried removing the ws_ex_layered style before resizing the window in my manual handling (I've tried both MoveWindow and SetWindowPos) then resetting the ex style after SetWindowPos / MoveWindow but before dragging.
When I let DefWindowProc handle the updates, I got the exact same result. So indications are that something is wrong with my repainting. But I even whittled that process down (commenting out oodles of code for test) and just filled the bitmap with 0xFF0000FF (arbitrary test value, blue, full opacity) then jumped straight to UpdateLayeredWindow. Same result.
The bitmap used for UpdateLayeredWindow is deleted before calling the "rebuild" function and within the function that bitmap is recreated to the new size. I have verified the new size extensively - I can see the new bitmap as it high-speed flickers and it's all good. The DC is GetWindowDC from the layered window. The compatible DC creates off that DC. The bitmap is selected into the compatible DC, and that compatible DC is passed to UpdateLayeredWindow. If any of these things were off, I would never see the new bitmap displayed. It's there - it just flickers at high speed ONLY beyond the window bounds that existed before resize began. DefWindowProc yields the same results. Within that original area, my caption buttons slide off to the right as I drag the right border to the right, further verifying everything is good.
I'm at a loss. Any input would be welcome.

Draw inside a win32 HRGN object

I am implementing a border control in win32, and I have implemented various styles for that border. I am using simple MoveTo() and LineTo() commands for drawing the border.
My problem is, when i select some new style for my border, it starts painting over the currently drawn border. I understand i need to refresh/repaint my window inorder to have a fresh canvas. I am using InvalidateRect() for now to achieve this purpose. But I am concerned, If i have other windows associated with my border control window (as child windows), how will this effect the child windows?i will need to repaint everything on this window, correct?
Secondly, Is there anyway I can draw lines inside a GDI Region (HRGN)? So far, all i have come across is how to fill up that HRGN with some fill color. Is there anyway i can retrieve HDC associated with that particular HRGN object??
This is not a concern, anything you draw is automatically clipped by the child window rectangles. No extra code is required. The underlying window style flag is WS_CLIPCHILDREN.
You cannot draw lines in a region nor are they associated with a device context. Other than by drawing the region and then drawing the lines in your paint message handler. You are probably interested in paths. The MSDN docs start here.

GDI fast scroll

I use GDI to create some custom textwidget. I draw directly to the screen, unbuffered.
now i'd like to implement some fast scrolling, that simply pixelshifts the respective part of the framebuffer (and only redraws the newly visible lines).
I noticed that for example the rich text controls does it like this. If i use some GDI drawing functions to directly draw to the framebuffer, over a rich text control, and then scroll the rich text, it will also scroll my drawing along with the text. so i assume the rich text simply pixelshifts it's part of the framebuffer.
I'd like to do the same, but don't know how to do so.
Can someone help? (independant of programming language))
thanks!
The ScrollWindowEx() API function is optimized to do this.
See BitBlt function:
The BitBlt function performs a
bit-block transfer of the color data
corresponding to a rectangle of pixels
from the specified source device
context into a destination device
context.
and the example at the end of its documentation: Capturing an Image:
You can use a bitmap to capture an
image, and you can store the captured
image in memory, display it at a
different location in your
application's window. [...]
In some cases, you may want your
application to capture images and
store them only temporarily. [...] To
store an image temporarily, your
application must call
CreateCompatibleDC to create a DC that
is compatible with the current window
DC. After you create a compatible DC,
you create a bitmap with the
appropriate dimensions by calling the
CreateCompatibleBitmap function and
then select it into this device
context by calling the SelectObject
function.
After the compatible device context is
created and the appropriate bitmap has
been selected into it, you can capture
the image. The BitBlt function
captures images. This function
performs a bit block transfer that is,
it copies data from a source bitmap
into a destination bitmap. [...]
To redisplay the image, call BitBlt a
second time, specifying the compatible
DC as the source DC and a window DC as
the target DC.

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