Enabling Hot Keys (Short Cut keys) for windows Application

Introduction

In .Net Windows Application Short Keys are not enabled automatically.

Background

Usually the underline appears only after you press the ALT Key, but you can enable it by changing the Operating System Settings. On Windows XP, Right Click Desktop to bring up the Display Properties Dialog and then choose Appearance tab and then the Effects Button and uncheck the checkbox "Hide Underlined letters for keyboard navigation until I press the ALT Key".

But how to do it programmatically? The below code demonstrate how to do that!!!

Using the code

Generally in Windows Projects, we will have General.cs Class which contains general functions, Constants, Delegates, and Global variables which are used by other classes of Application.

Paste code in General.cs

[DllImport ("user32.dll")] 
static extern void SystemParametersInfo(uint uiAction, uint uiParam, ref int pvParam, 
                                        uint fWinIni); 

 
/* Constants used for User32 calls. */ 
const uint SPI_SETKEYBOARDCUES = 0x100B; 

/// <summary> 
/// Change the setting programmatically 
/// for keyboard shortcut Issue 
/// </summary> 
private static void GetAltKeyFixed() 
{ 
   int pv = 1; 
   /* Call to systemparametersinfo to set true of pv variable.*/ 
   SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETKEYBOARDCUES, 0, ref pv, 0); 
   //Set pvParam to TRUE to always underline menu access keys, 
}

Please add

using System.Runtime.InteropServices; 

assembly in General.cs

and call GetAltKeyFixed in Program.cs before Application.Run(new <FormNameWhichIsToBeDisplayed>);

Or copy below code before Application.Run(new ......)

General _General=new general();
_General.GetAltKeyFixed();

Points of Interest

This issue is seems to be there for all .net windows applications.

Adding Two lines of code, will fix Displaying Underline Issue for Shortcut keys of application