Limit mouse movement to one window only - windows

I am trying to mimic a Head-Up Display in a racing simulator, and I want to display a semi-transperant program window (i.e. a browser window showing a java applet) which limits mouse movements to that window only.
That way I can use a USB-track pad or the like to interact with the content in the dialog screen while still interacting with the racing simulator.
My question is mainly focused on the restriction of mouse movement, is this possible in Windows 7?
Regards

Use the ClipCursor API call - Make sure you undo any clipping when your window is deactivated or minimized.

Related

Make a key click a certain place on the screen

I am running a game that has buttons on both sides of the screen, which gives you an easy control on a tablet. But on ARC it makes it difficult to use because you need to move your mouse across the screen a bunch of times. Does ARC Welder have an option to make a key on the keyboard "tap" a certain place on the screen?
If you are comfortable with the concept of scripting, you could use AutoHotKey to use keyboard events to click specific areas of the screen. This would be through your OS, not the ARC, but I think the script can be linked to a specific application so it will only run with that app.
See specifically Click

Hide window when other application in fullscreen mode (pseudo fullscreen)

I have an application for Windows which is basically a toolbar on top of all windows.
Unfortunately, our users ask why does it overlap a fullscreen video playing in Google Chrome. Since the application works with no issues along with other fullscreen applications (such as games), it seems to be a pseudo fullscreen mode. How do we hide the toolbar in such cases?
Right now there is only one idea: keep an eye on MoveWindow, compare window class name against a predefined list and rectangle against screen size then deduce whether it is the 'pseuso fullscreen' mode. Any better ideas?

Is it possible to programmatically detect a click on the mac desktop?

I want to whip something up that would run a small script every time i clicked on the Desktop. Any hints on how to make this happen?
For those interested, the script would toggle the display of desktop icons.
I assume you mean on the desktop background, not any icon. You could create a transparent overlay window, use [window setIgnoresMouseEvents:NO] to make it receive clicks, and set its window level to something between the desktop and the icons (kCGDesktopWindowLevel and kCGDesktopIconWindowLevel).
You would presumably want to create one of those per screen and monitor for changes in the screen configuration to add, remove, or resize them as appropriate. Either observe the NSApplicationDidChangeScreenParametersNotification or implement the -applicationDidChangeScreenParameters: application delegate method (which amounts to the same thing).

Win7 and multiple monitors: switch focus when moving mouse to different monitor?

I recently upgraded to a dual monitor setup at work, and while the extra real estate is very nice, there's one annoyance: my intuitive reaction is that there are two "active" windows now, namely the topmost window in each monitor -- and I frequently get surprised when keyboard events go to the actual active window, rather than the one I've moused over and am looking at.
There's a setting in the control panel that gives this effect (ease of access -> make the mouse easier to use -> activate a window by hovering over it with the mouse) but it also acts on windows within the same monitor, which I don't want.
I frequently use my ThinkPad's scrolling function on unfocused windows which I don't want to receive focus, which come to think of it probably adds to my confusion, since I can scroll my email in the other window but my keyboard shortcuts don't go there.
Is there any way to achieve this effect or am I just wishing?
Thanks,
Ryan
Yeah, get a Mac :-p
In all seriousness OS X does provide this functionality. It might be worth searching for an add on that does the same sort of thing. I know of Wizmouse -- http://antibody-software.com/web/software/software/wizmouse-makes-your-mouse-wheel-work-on-the-window-under-the-mouse/
There might be more though.
AT LAST!!! Windows 10 has this support :-)
SM
You can change the settings to use classic windows appearance etc. and try to focus on the border color of the window. The board changes on the active window.
I use two monitors and there really isn't much you can do besides change your behavior.
Select things from the taskbar, drag active windows to the same screen and always refer to inactive windows by moving them to the inactive windows monitor and remember to go back to the window you want to be active.

Non-modal notification bars?

How can I implement a non-modal sliding notification bar, such as Firefox, Beyond Compare, and VMware Workstation 6.5 use, in client-side Windows apps?
Any language or framework is fine for now; my current app is in Delphi / C++Builder, but I'm also interested in comparing frameworks and prototyping some UIs.
Related question: This question asks about doing so in Java.
Beyond Compare's notification bar doesn't slide, it just pops open, so I can't offer any help on that. The notification bar itself is just a TPanel with a TImage and TLabel for the image/text. It's placed on the main window at design time and it's set to align bottom. Normally it's hidden, and when there's a message to display we set the Visible property to true.
There's different ways to hide the notification, depending on how you want it to behave. In BC we install keyboard and mouse hooks (SetWindowsHookEx with WH_KEYBOARD or WH_MOUSE) and hide it on key up and mouse button events. Alternatively, like Mark said, you could hide it after a delay, add a close button to the side, or just watch for specific events in your app and manually hide it then.
In Delphi, I believe that you can change a property on the Dialog itself (change the window type away from "Dialog" and select the standard windowed alternative). Sorry I cannot be more specific, it has been about two years since I last worked on a Delphi app.

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