How can you go about adding different program windows to an existing taskbar group tab on the Windows taskbar?
I figured out how to use the ITaskbarList2 interface and am able to add/remove tabs on the Windows taskbar. However, what I need to do is to be able to add windows to that new tab based on certain criteria. I, also, downloaded a program that allows you to add any program window to any taskbar tab, giving the user power over the taskbar grouping. That's what I need to be able to do programatically.
The issue I am trying to solve is...
At work, the traders use a program that spawns different child processes for their portfolios and other stuff. Each window's caption contains the type of window that it is. So, for instance, if a window is spawned for a portfolio view, the window caption would contain "Portfolio". If a window is spawned for their trade ledger, the window caption would contain "Ledger", etc.
The traders could have 20 or 30 windows opened at a time -- 10 ledger windows and 10 portfolio windows or whatever. The problem is that Windows XP will automatically group each window into a single tab on the taskbar (since they are all part of the same main program executable).
What I need is a way to search all the windows currently on the taskbar, find the windows that correspond to the main application and then group those windows according to their window captions. So, all the "ledger" windows would be grouped together in 1 tab and then all the "portfolio" windows would be grouped in another single tab, etc.
I know there's a way to do this, since the program I downloaded allows for this functionality manually. Since it's a program that is not mine, I can't reverse engineer it and see how it is achieving this functionality. But since it can do it -- the functionality is possible.
So, how can this be done? I don't care if the code is in C# or C++ (my guess is it would most likely be in C++). Does anybody know how to do this?
Thanks in advance.
This Question has been solved and asker verified All Experts Exchange premium technology solutions are available to subscription members.
Experts Exchange has been collecting answers to technology questions since 1996…3 million and counting! If you have a question, chances are we already have your answer.
If you can't find the exact answer you're looking for, ask our exclusive community of 50,000 experts. You’ll get a personalized answer from a trusted professional.
Thousands of free tech tips, tricks, how-to’s and tutorials are available in our peer reviewed articles section. See for yourself how smart our experts are, no login required.
Save solutions to your questions, answers you’ve discovered through searching plus helpful articles in your personal knowledgebase for easy future access.
Access the answers to your technology questions today.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Members of the expert community talk about why the experience at Experts Exchange is different than what you will find anywhere else.
Try it out and discover for yourself.
30-day free trial. Register in 60 seconds.
Join the community of experts here and help other tech pros by answering question in your area of expertise. You can earn FREE access to all Experts Exchange's premium features and resources.
Hi, dont know about the C+++ but just to offer you an alternative idea in the meantime is objectdock,
lets you organise numerous docks and add in any shortcuts to programs and running tasks.
Uisng this tool myself I can manage everything, reduce the size of the docks even hide them.
http://www.stardock.com/pr
I meant to add
images here with fly out menues
http://www.stardock.com/pr
you can view a video here
http://www.stardock.com/pr
Thanks! I have both those programs installed on my machine. The one that is the most relevant for me is the wsTaskborg program. I read the tutorial the guy gave and I think I understand how to do it, but it's still a little iffy -- especially since he's using a lot of undocumented windows api functions. I am going to take another crack at it tomorrow at work, but if anyone has any experience in working with the windows taskbar in the way the writer of the wsTaskborg program had -- any help would be appreciated.
The tricky part will be if you need to get text, or have a structure populated from the Explorer's process space. See:
http://www.experts-exc
f
Cool. I will definitely give it a try. I think the hard part is going to be adding the programs to different tabs on the taskbar. I understand how to get the child windows, etc. and get the text of the windows and stuff. I have to see how hard it will be to add a window to a new tab I create. It's got to be one of the TB_BUTTON messages. I'll have to just mess with it.
Business Accounts
Answer for Membership
by: DanRollinsPosted on 2009-11-02 at 15:22:11ID: 25724824
Taskbar Shuffle http://nerdcave.webs.com/
.
This guy has written a similar tool,
wsTaskborg
http://w-shadow.com/wstask
And rather than patenting or hiding his methods, he describes it quite completely here:
Manipulating Taskbar Buttons
http://w-shadow.com/blog/2
It boils down to the fact that the taskbar is just a ToolbarWindow32 (see http://msdn.microsoft.com/