Using the pbm_syscommand message

 

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Author Aart Onkenhout
Date 04-11-2000

 

A frequently asked question is: how can I captrue the F10 key or capture clicking on the X-button. Those things can be done by adding a user-event to your Window and map it to pbm_syscommand. A WM_SYSCOMMAND message is sent to your WIndow whenever the user chooses a command from the window menu (or systemmenu) or when the user chooses the maximize button, minimize button, restore button or close button.

 

You can check for these messages in your user-event or sent them yourself by sending a WM_SYSCOMMAND (= 274) message to your WIndow. This would look like:

 

Send( Handle( yourWindow ), WM_SYSCOMMAND, SC_CLOSE, 0 )

 

The values for the different messages are as follows:

 

Message Value LPARAM Description
WM_SYSCOMMAND 274    
SC_SIZE 61440   Sizes the Window.
SC_MOVE 61456   Moves the Window.
SC_MINIMIZE 61472   User clicked the Minimize-button
SC_MAXIMIZE 61488   User clicked the Maximize-button
SC_CLOSE 61536   User clicked the Close-button
SC_KEYMENU 61696 Contains the character code of the key that is used with the Alt key. When pressing F10 or just Alt this value is 0. User pressed F10, Alt or another menu-shortkey.
SC_RESTORE 61728   User clicked the Restore-button
SC_TASKLIST 61744   Activates the Start menu.
SC_SCREENSAVE 61760   Executes the screensaver application specified in the [boot] section of the system.ini file.
SC_MONITORPOWER 61808

1 = the display is going to low power

2 = the display is being shut off

Sets the state of the display.

 

A point of attention here: the four low-order bits of the wparam value (which gives you your commandtype value) are used internally by the system and make the value of wparam vary between the values mentioned above plus 15 (so, SC_SIZE has values within the range from 61440 uptil and including 61455). To obtain the correct result when testing the value of wparam you have to combine the wparam value with the value 0xFFF0 (65520). You can do this by using the bitwise AND operator (see the of_BitwiseAnd function within the PFC object pfc_n_cst_numerical how to do this).

 

 

Moving your window without having a TitleBar

 

By using the SC_MOVE message you can move a Window without a Titlebar. Add one line of code to the mousedown-event:

 

Send( Handle( yourWindow ), WM_SYSCOMMAND, SC_MOVE + 2, 0 )

 

You have to add two to fake that your mouse is on the TitleBar.

 

 

Capture the F10 key

 

When you want to capture the F10 systemkey, you can code something like this:

 

Declare an instance variable:

 

Boolean    ib_AltPressed

 

In the systemkey-event of your Window (this is a predefined Window-event) add:

 

If key = KeyAlt! Then

   ib_AltPressed = True

Else

   ib_AltPressed = False

End If

 

In the userevent for pbm_syscommand code (this example makes use of the PFC function of_BitwiseAnd):

 

n_cst_numerical   lnv_Numerical

Constant Long     ll_Mask = 65520

 

If lnv_Numerical.of_BitwiseAnd( commandtype, ll_Mask ) = SC_KEYMENU Then

   If Message.LongParm = 0 And not ib_AltPressed Then

      Do Something...

      Return 1    //   .. do not process this message any further

   End If

End If

 

Before the wm_syscommand message is sent to your Window, a wm_syskeydown message is sent. This message is mapped to the PowerBuilder systemkey Window event. Because you can't know within the wm_syscommand message if the user pressed F10 or Alt, you can receive this information within the systemkey event. One drawback of this approach is: the systemkey event isn't triggered when the focus is on a editable DataWindow-column. In this case, you don't know what key was pressed to fire the wm_syscommand message.

 

 

Other messages

 

There are some other messages. You can check them out at:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/winui/winui/windowsuserinterface/userinput/keyboardaccelerators/keyboardacceleratorreference/keyboardacceleratormessages/wm_syscommand.asp