virtual keypad (A-Z buttons on the form)

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hi,

i am designing a windows application for tablet pc using vb.net 2.0.
On all my forms i want A-Z and 0-9 keys on the form itself.
On press of any of these keys user would be able to type anywhere where there is a cursor.
The problem is if i press the button the focus shifts to the button and thus losing the cursor from the input control.
Can anybody tell how can I make my buttons focusless so that the cursor remains on the input control?
Also if there is any other approach i can use.
I am not supposed to use the virtual keyboard.

regards,
gopal

Posted 3-Mar-11 21:16pm

gopalgupta

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3 solutions

Solution 1

I answered similar questions several times, please see this:

Application focus getting and losing[^]
Programming on BACKSPACE button[^]

Sorry, the first Question is in C#, but if you want to get good help and code sample and you do .NET development without some understanding of C# you won't get much help anyway.

—SA

Posted 3-Mar-11 21:39pm

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov

Updated 3-Mar-11 21:41pm

v2

Comments

Espen Harlinn 8-Mar-11 15:16pm

Yepp, my 5, by using WS_EX_NOACTIVATE you avoid a lot of thorny issues, and keeping the window on top is also more or less required - good links :)

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 8-Mar-11 15:24pm

Thank you. In fact, both things are required in practice.
--SA

Solution 2

Here is an article Touchscreen Keyboard UserControl[^]

There is also another alternative:
How to show, close, move or resize the On-Screen Keyboard[^] - if you are using a tablet, this shows how to interact with the windows wirtual keyboard ...

For more info on what's available with windows take a look at Tablet PC[^]

WM_SETFOCUS[^] - wParam contains the handle of the previous focused window.

Handling the event by overriding

VB

Protected Overridable Sub WndProc ( _
    ByRef m As Message _
)

for your control. This may be required since Control.GotFocus Event[^] does not include the handle to the previously focused window.

Regards
Espen Harlinn

Posted 3-Mar-11 21:51pm

Espen Harlinn

Updated 3-Mar-11 22:10pm

v2

Comments

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 6-Mar-11 19:07pm

Very good references and recommendations, my 5.
I still think my method also works well, based on minimalistic approaches and is well tested.
--SA

Espen Harlinn 8-Mar-11 11:48am

Thanks SAKryukov - I'm not 100% sure the input from the virtual keyboard ends up at the right input position as it may be that the only really solution is to write a device driver for delivering keyboard input to the target application, and use hooks to keep track of the window that is to recieve the input - at least if it is to work with all applications. sending WM_KEY_XXX may not be good enough

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 8-Mar-11 14:12pm

Actually, if you look at my answer you will see how all the problems can be addressed. I happened to implement a good Virtual keyboard component (around 2006); this is not very trivial.
--SA

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gopalgupta · Accepted Answer · 2011-03-21T10:07:00

Solution 3

well guys thanx for all ur support...
my application is live now....
however the solution to my problem was quite simple...

Instead of buttons, i used labels and on the click of that label i used sendkeys.

Regards
gopal

Posted 21-Mar-11 10:07am

gopalgupta

v2