Window Loses Focus?

**Stalemate** · February 25th, 2008, 11:32 AM

Has anyone ever experienced this and found a way around it?

In a nutshell, a warning popup window is generated on the screen, yet does not retain focus. The title bar flashes non-stop and the buttons in the window need to be accessed using a mouse, as using the Enter key to "press" the highlighted button will not work.

Here's the longer post I made in the software forums for the product I think is responsible:

Whenever an end of batch occurs wth VRS 4.1, the error/notification popup window is displayed onscreen, waiting for user confirmation before proceeding.

Previously, on a Windows 2000 Pro PC, the end user could simply hit the Enter key and move on to the next task, as the Cancel button was already highlighted in this message window.

Now, after a PC upgrade, this same popup window behaves in a different manner which prevents the Enter key from being used directly. The window's title bar will flash repeatedly, and the user must now use the mouse to bring focus back to this message window and then acknowledge the error by clicking on the Cancel button.

Following this, the focus is not switched back to the document management software waiting in the background, as it previously did, and the user must once more click in that window to bring focus back to it.

This new PC uses Windows XP with all the latest service packs.

I also followed the tips indicated in this thread, but the end user wants to keep the error popup on screen so this option can't be used.

Any ideas how focus could be retained by the error window (as it did in Win2000) instead of having it flash in and out of focus?

But now, after talking to others about this, I'm thinking it may indeed be a Windows issue, and not necessarily the software's fault (VRS is a scanner management app).

Anyone have ideas or suggestions?

**NooNoo** · February 25th, 2008, 11:43 AM

Your link to the tips thread links to a thread about making settings changes that can be done with group policy or similar...

Is the window a proper gui or is it a cmd window?

**Stalemate** · February 25th, 2008, 11:54 AM

Hi Noo!

The tip is actually referring to an administration tool that ships with the problematic VRS application. This was the only option which, while solving the problem by removing the entire popup message window, was not acceptable to the end user. The other options weren't pertinent to the issue at hand.

This trouble is already a time-waster, and we know it, but the client insists so therefore we're looking into it. I guess her taking the extra .5 seconds to click on the window is worth much more than the hours my co-worker and I are putting into this.

it's an actual Windows GUI window that pops up, with borders, title bar and the usual expected control buttons on said title bar. Unless the app is simulating this perfectly it should be a normal GUI window.

**NooNoo** · February 25th, 2008, 12:03 PM

I wonder if it is its own module... the behaviour is as if something is asking it to go to background... I would think it's not strictly a windows problem in that it is likely to be the way that the sheet is called by the software. Obviously it's not a modal sheet, so the software is trying to move on but requires an answer. Is it just the OS that has been upgraded, or has the machine been upgraded too?

**Stalemate** · February 25th, 2008, 12:09 PM

Originally Posted by NooNoo

I wonder if it is its own module... the behaviour is as if something is asking it to go to background... I would think it's not strictly a windows problem in that it is likely to be the way that the sheet is called by the software. Obviously it's not a modal sheet, so the software is trying to move on but requires an answer. Is it just the OS that has been upgraded, or has the machine been upgraded too?

Both PC and OS - fresh new install but the exact same version for software itself (latest available)

**NooNoo** · February 25th, 2008, 12:11 PM

I wonder if this is a threading issue then...an interesting experiment would be to put 2k on the same hardware and see if it behaves differently.

**Stalemate** · February 25th, 2008, 02:13 PM

I received a suggestion to try TweakUI to try controlling the loss of focus caused by the "flashing", so I'm asking the local tech to give that a try and see if it works.

If it doesn't, I think that might be an indicator that the window is, in fact, generated by the application and does not comply to the Windows GUI.

**Stalemate** · February 26th, 2008, 09:45 AM

I should have some feedback on this later today, as the onsite tech couldn't get access to the workstation.

**Stalemate** · February 29th, 2008, 10:01 AM

Took a while, but I got some positive feedback.

By unchecking the TweakUI setting "Prevent Applications from Stealing Focus", the window remained up, stopped flashing, en the end user was able to use the Enter key again to cancel the error message.

Victory!