Get Names of Controls in Windows Application

[Rich Brockway]

I have a client need to get the names and details of the controls in a Windows application. A few years back, I remember downloading an application that a PB user created.

You would start the "viewer" application. Then, start the application of interest. You would click on the application of interest's form and it would give you all the information.

Does anyone know where I can download this?

Thanks!

Rich

[Kev Peel]

It's called PBWinSpy. Borje's site:

http://www.reonis.com/POFFS/index.htm

[Michael Mattias]

If you can't find it (I would swear someone posted something in Source Code Forum to do this)...

WindowFromPoint()
followed by
EnumChildWindows()

.. would let you write one yourself. You can get whatever info you want about the child windows in your callback for EnumChildWindows.

MCM

[Cliff Nichols]

Rich,
Funny you should mention something like that, since I am working on something along the lines of "PB Winspy" from Borje except it would be an *.inc file to catch and translate windows messages into code that the programmer would understand.

(Aka: stuff like 8675309 would translate to Hdlg, %IDC_BUTTON1, %BN_CLICKED, 0)

which you would know each parameter, the control that it was meant for, etc but from within your own program.

Still just beginning, but one catch I do have is if 8675309 is the handle to the control, I can find (%WM_USER + 1) as the control id, but not the equates I used (aka: %IDC_BUTTON1 = %WM_USER + 1) where I would like to return "%IDC_BUTTON1"

Maybe can't be done, maybe can....but still working on it

[Dominic Mitchell]

Still just beginning, but one catch I do have is if 8675309 is the handle to the control, I can
find (%WM_USER + 1) as the control id, but not the equates I used (aka: %IDC_BUTTON1 = %WM_USER + 1)
where I would like to return "%IDC_BUTTON1"

Cannot be done.
Well, the utility can ask for a list of the symbols the programmer assigned to controls on the dialogs
it is about to scan, but even then it is not foolproof. Controls can create embedded child controls, the
identifiers of which, the programmer has no control over. An impractical solution in my opinion.

By the way, please don't use WM_xxx as ID symbols for controls. You will confuse your users.

The following are the standard idenfiers for command buttons on a dialog.
Note: IDC_STATIC is the identifier that is given to a control when its identifier is not important. For example, a label.

IDC_STATIC  = -1
IDOK        = 1
IDCANCEL    = 2
IDABORT     = 3
IDRETRY     = 4
IDIGNORE    = 5
IDYES       = 6
IDNO        = 7
IDCLOSE     = 8
IDHELP      = 9
IDTRYAGAIN  = 10
IDCONTINUE  = 11

[Michael Mattias]

>where I would like to return "%IDC_BUTTON1"

Once a program is compiled, there are no symbols. %IDC_BUTTON1 has been reduced to a numeric value ( in your case, &h401, WM_USER + 1) .

Symbolic debuggers build cross-reference tables of "programmer's symbol" to "compiled numeric value" at compile time, but if you had control over this program at compile time, you would not be asking this question, would you?

MCM

[Michael Mattias]

> have a client need to get the names and details of the controls in a Windows application

Let's go back a step. For what purpose do you "need" these details?

Can't you look at the screen and figure out what kind of control you could use to "do that?"

MCM

[Cliff Nichols]

I can see where you are going MCM (even though a bit more than see a Button...but know it is a button? or of a button class????"


Rich,
Is most (if not all) of your questions solved with Borge's Winspy???

(short, sweet, and no need for me to hijack someone else's question)

[Michael Mattias]

> can see where you are going MCM

I hope you can, because I have posted similar messages requesting the "What" so the poster can receive multiple suggestions for the "How" only about 6,214 times.

If the "what" is "make a new screen which does <something>", then looking at the application requirements as well as the existing screen should be sufficient.

If, however, the "what" is an attempt to control a non-cooperating application, that is something else, and likely what is needed to accomplish that is NOT "all details of all controls;" rather what is likely needed is certain specific information about certain specific controls.

MCM