C# WPF detect cursor change

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Hi
I am writing a program to display hotkeys being used for video tutorials.

I need to detect an I-Beam cursor globally or a global cursor change. This is for the purpose of detecting if the user is entering some text or about to enter some text, in which case it is not a hotkey and as such don't show whats being typed.

Is it possible to do this in a C# WPF application ? - I have googled it to death, and nothing really tells me how to do this.

Any Help would be appreciated

Rob

What I have tried:

[DllImport("user32.dll")]
public static extern bool GetCursorInfo(out CursorInfo info);

Posted 5-Apr-23 16:12pm

Robert Andersen 2022

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Dave Kreskowiak 5-Apr-23 22:43pm

I don't even think Windows support such a notification. I've never heard of anything like that.

Robert Andersen 2022 5-Apr-23 22:53pm

OK - that sucks, but thanks mate!

0x01AA 6-Apr-23 7:05am

Can be I don't understand your request. But for me it looks like you need something like this: Preview events - WPF .NET | Microsoft Learn[^]

Robert Andersen 2022 6-Apr-23 11:16am

Thanks - tunneling is probably above my pay grade
What I am ultimately trying to do is detect the user is about to enter text, ie: renam something, enter numeric sizes etc. If the user is about to do any of these don't show keyboard hotkeys on tutorial screen. The only two ways I can think off to do this, is to detect an active caret, or see if the cursor changes to the I-Beam.

Rob

0x01AA 6-Apr-23 11:21am

You are welcome.
'tunneling is probably above my pay grade': I don't think so, give it a try ;)

[no name] 6-Apr-23 10:28am

You're confusing "what you see" with what you've got. The UI is an "illusion"; unless you understand the underlying mechanics (focus, event tunneling and bubbling, keyboard previewing, etc), you will get "nowhere".

Robert Andersen 2022 6-Apr-23 11:17am

I was hoping for a simple solution - but it doesn't appear there is one - Rob

[no name] 7-Apr-23 8:57am

It is "simple". "Renaming, entering numbers" all involve a "TextBox". It gains "focus" when the "cursor" lands on it; it "loses" focus when you move to another focusable item; these are "events" one can track. In addtion, entering "anything" into a TextBox will fire a "TextChanged" event. This tells you a lot more about "context" and the "active element" than any blinking (image of a) cursor.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.windows.uielement.gotkeyboardfocus?view=windowsdesktop-7.0

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