Get mouse position from desktop not form

There are frequent uses for the following code strategies:

(code here assumes you execute it inside a MouseDown or MouseUp EventHandler)

1. the e.Location and e.X and e.Y parameters supplied to the MouseDown and MouseUp Events always give you the current location of the mouse-down/up and the top,left location of the Control clicked on ...

in co-ordinates relative to the control (or Form) that contains the control.

2. to find out where the mousedown/up occurred in terms of the desktop co-ordinate system:

Point screenLoc = this.PointToScreen(e.Location);

where 'this is the current control/form context you work with.

3. assuming a control may be nested inside another Control, and you want to know where the click occurred in the Form (the outermost container) that contains it:

Point formLoc = this.TopLevelControl.PointToClient(this.PointToScreen(e.Location));

TopLevelControl ... see: [^].

You're close. In your form, create a MouseUp Event. Then add some code to the event.

private void Form1_MouseUp(object sender, MouseEventArgs e)
{
    label1.Text = (e.X + Location.X) + ", " + (e.Y + Location.Y) + " ClickType:" + e.Button;
}

In the code, MouseEventArgs e is an object with the position of your mouse inside your form.
MouseEventArgs also knows the type of mouse click via the e.Button.
Location or this.Location refers to the Form class that you're in. So Location.X will be the X location of the form relative to the screen you're looking at. Same with Location.Y

So the whole program

using System.Windows.Forms;

namespace MousePosition
{
    public partial class Form1 : Form
    {
        public Form1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }

        private void Form1_MouseUp(object sender, MouseEventArgs e)
        {
            label1.Text = (e.X + Location.X) + ", " + (e.Y + Location.Y) + " ClickType:" + e.Button;
        }
    }
}

Have fun coding!

Hogan

Take a look at this CodeProject article:
Global Mouse and Keyboard Library[^]