SendInput VB Basic Example

Question

I hope someone can assist, I trying to find an example of a SendInput code that simulate keyboard commands, I wish to find the notepad window and enter a test message.

Answer 1

The following code is not for VB.net but VB/VBA, its similar to the sendkeys method but probably a little more reliable as it sends the keys specifically to the target application. (the post where i got it shows the sendkeys method too)

Public Declare Function FindWindowX Lib "user32" Alias "FindWindowExA" (ByVal hWnd1 As Long, _
ByVal hWnd2 As Long, ByVal lpsz1 As Long, ByVal lpsz2 As Long) As Long

Public Declare Function FindWindow Lib "user32" Alias "FindWindowA" (ByVal lpClassName As String, ByVal lpWindowName As String) As Long

Private Declare Function PostMessage Lib "user32" Alias "PostMessageA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, _
ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Long, ByVal lParam As Long) As Long

Public Declare Function SendMessage Lib "user32" Alias "SendMessageA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Integer, ByVal lParam As Integer) As Long

Private Const WM_KEYDOWN = &H100
Private Const WM_KEYUP = &H101

Sub Three()
    hWind = FindWindow(vbNullString, "Untitled - Notepad")
    cWind = FindWindowX(hWind, 0, 0, 0)
    Debug.Print PostMessage(cWind, WM_KEYDOWN, vbKeyA, 0)
    Debug.Print PostMessage(cWind, WM_KEYDOWN, vbKeyB, 0)
    Debug.Print PostMessage(cWind, WM_KEYDOWN, vbKeyC, 0)
End Sub

Code taken from this forum post

If you paste this into a new module in Excel/VBA and have an new instance of notepad running, when the sub is executed "abc" should appear in notepad.

I don't see how using this, or the sendkeys method could "damage" the target window. So long as you time the messages properly (not sending tonnes of characters to the window all at the same time) it shouldn't cause any problems.