How to capture the events of a notepad in windows application

Hello,

You will have to use SetWinEventHook function.

Details here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd373640%28v=vs.85%29.aspx[^]

JAFC

#include <windows.h>
#include <process.h>

#include <oleacc.h>
#pragma comment (lib, "oleacc.lib")

#include <cstdio>

void CALLBACK HandleWinEvent(HWINEVENTHOOK hook, DWORD event, HWND hwnd, LONG idObject, LONG idChild, DWORD dwEventThread, DWORD dwmsEventTime)
{
	IAccessible* pAcc = NULL;
	VARIANT varChild;

	HRESULT hr = AccessibleObjectFromEvent(hwnd, idObject, idChild, &pAcc, &varChild);  

	if ((hr == S_OK) && (pAcc != NULL))
	{
		VARIANT varResult = {};
		pAcc->get_accRole(varChild, &varResult);

		if (varResult.lVal == ROLE_SYSTEM_PAGETAB || varResult.lVal == NULL)
		{
			BSTR bstrName;
			pAcc->get_accName(varChild, &bstrName);

			if (event == EVENT_OBJECT_CREATE) 
			{
				printf("Create: ");
			}
			else if (event == EVENT_OBJECT_DESTROY)
			{
				printf("Destroy:   ");
			}
			printf("%S\n", bstrName);
			SysFreeString(bstrName);
		}
		pAcc->Release();
	}
}

unsigned __stdcall hook(void* args)
{
	HWND hWindow = FindWindow(TEXT("Notepad++"), NULL);

	if (hWindow != NULL)
	{
		DWORD ProcessId, ThreadId;
		ThreadId = GetWindowThreadProcessId(hWindow, &ProcessId);

		CoInitialize(NULL);
		HWINEVENTHOOK hHook = SetWinEventHook(EVENT_OBJECT_CREATE, EVENT_OBJECT_DESTROY, NULL, HandleWinEvent, ProcessId, ThreadId, WINEVENT_OUTOFCONTEXT);

		MSG msg;
		while (GetMessage(&msg, NULL, 0, 0) > 0);
		
		UnhookWinEvent(hHook);
		CoUninitialize();
	}
	return 0;
}

int main()
{
	unsigned ThreadId;
	HANDLE hThread = (HANDLE)_beginthreadex(NULL, 0, hook, NULL, 0, &ThreadId);

	for (;; Sleep(100))
	{
		if (GetAsyncKeyState(VK_END) & 0x8000) // Press End to exit
		{
			PostThreadMessage(ThreadId, WM_QUIT, 0, 0);
			WaitForSingleObject(hThread, 3000);
			break;
		}
	}
	CloseHandle(hThread);
	return 0;
}

Run Notepad++ first, then the program above, create some new tabs in Notepad++ and you'll see the tab names output to the console.

Note: The destroy event is less reliable, properties (name, role, etc) are NULL, you may want to create a map of child ids and their names from EVENT_OBJECT_CREATE, then whenever you receive a destroy event, check the map for the id and handle appropriately.

Pasted from: http://www.cplusplus.com/forum/windows/58791/[^]