[jawsscripts] Re: find descendent window
- From: "Geoff Chapman" <gch@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 29 Nov 2013 15:42:37 +1100
Ah. K wow thanks Doug much for that aditional and very useful explanitory
info!
----- Original Message -----
From: "Doug Lee" <doug.lee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, November 29, 2013 9:45 AM
Subject: [jawsscripts] Re: find descendent window
> Window hierarchy position is not guaranteed to stay constant any more
> than the positions of cars in a McDonald's drive-through line are sure
> to be the same every morning. Some do stay constant, but there are
> things that commonly change this. For example, when you switch tabs in
> a tab control, the newly selected tab's container window will often
> move to a getHierarchyX position of 1 at its level. This is because it
> is advancing to the top of what is called Z order. Z order and
> WindowHierarchyX are basically the same thing, a fact that escaped my
> attention for many scripting years. A similar thing can happen when
> you use Ctrl+Tab to move among subparts of a multi-window app that
> uses MDI windows. Windows can also get created and destroyed as you
> enable or disable parts of dialogs in some applications.
>
> I'd say identifying the window you want reliably is a similar problem
> to identifying a friend reliably: What characteristics make the window
> or friend unique depends on who or what else is around. "The girl on
> stage" doesn't work when it's a women's choir up there, but "the tall
> one with the bright shirt" just might. Part of window identification,
> then, is about figuring out what stays unique for your window in the
> situations when you need it. Its window class won't change in most
> cases, but you have to know if others of that class exist. More than
> once I've tried findWindow(getTopLevelWindow(getFocus()), "Internet
> Explorer_Server", "") only to discover that an invisible Internet
> Explorer_Server can exist in a subregion of the app I hadn't been
> paying attention to. If you don't mind a bit of drudgery for the sake
> of robustness, you can always use EnumerateChildWindows() and write a
> callback function for it that sifts among all the matches to your
> first test, like window class, to find the one you really want.
>
> On Fri, Nov 29, 2013 at 08:56:26AM +1100, Geoff Chapman wrote:
> Doug this is probably a totally stupid newby green question to ask, but,
> why, goodness me why, for such a seemingly so regularly needed and useful
> type of functionality, wouldn't there be a more elegant way in jaws of
> locating a given window?
>
> i guess there *must* be a technical reason other than mere
> short-sightedness
> on the part of the script language creators, but, is there?
> or is it just like the whole Aray thing, which it took till jaws 11/12 to
> even introduce, when I remember people had been ruing the lack of such an
> apparently normative programming language feature, for years before that.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Doug Lee" <doug.lee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Friday, November 29, 2013 5:31 AM
> Subject: [jawsscripts] Re: find descendent window
>
>
>> Using hierarchical position to find a window is a bit time-consuming
>> if you're trying to get to it, but a bit less if you're just trying
>> to identify a window you already have.
>>
>> GetWindowHierarchyX(hwnd) and GetWindowHierarchyY(hwnd) will give
>> you an idea where a window can be found in the hierarchy, provided
>> you already have a window handle. The trick here, though, is that
>> you need the GetWindowHierarchyX value for each level from that
>> window up to the top, if you want to find the window again later.
>>
>> I say it's time-consuming to find the window later because there's no
>> function in JAWS scripting to go straight to the nth window at a
>> level, so you have to loop once for each level until you get to the
>> right window for that level.
>>
>> In physical terms, it's like this: I'm hiding out on a leaf.
>> GetWindowHierarchyY tells you I'm four branch splits from the tree
>> trunk, and getWindowHierarchyX tells you I'm the third leaf on my
>> branch. The problem is, you don't know where my branch is on the
>> branch it comes from, or where that one is on the one it comes from,
>> etc. You need something like, "Go to the second branch from the trunk,
>> then the fifth branch from that one, then the second branch from that,
>> and then the third leaf on that one." This takes a bit of doing in
>> JAWS.
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 28, 2013 at 12:41:37PM -0500, Bissett, Tom wrote:
>> Thanks Dug for responding. I do get what you are saying. I was hoping I
>> could maybe find the descendent window by its position in the hierarchy
>> and then grab its handle from there. This may not have been clear from
>> my
>> original request.
>> Maybe this is more clear. Its may be just to cumbersome to be practical
>> as well.
>> Regards
>> Tom Bisset
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: jawsscripts-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> [mailto:jawsscripts-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Doug Lee
>> Sent: November 28, 2013 12:13 PM
>> To: jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: [jawsscripts] Re: find descendent window
>>
>> What I'm about to say is honestly not meant to sound flippant, but I'm
>> still afraid it might:
>>
>> Most any search tactic will require that you know what you're looking
>> for,
>> so I'm having trouble identifying specifically what is troubling you.
>> FindDescendantWindow requires a control ID. I find useful and unique
>> control IDs rather scarce these days, so I usually use FindWindow
>> instead,
>> as it can search by window class name, window name, or both at once. If
>> your application sports unique and consistent control Ids, you can use
>> findDescendantWindow to good advantage though.
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 28, 2013 at 11:49:32AM -0500, Bissett, Tom wrote:
>> Hi, I have been trying to figure out how to find a specific descendent
>> window based on higharchy but haven't clude in yet. FindDescendentWindow
>> requires that you know what you are looking for so this does not work for
>> me.
>> Can any one point me in the right direction?
>> Thanks
>> Tom Bisset
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>> SSB BART Group - Accessibility-on-Demand
>> mailto:doug.lee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
>> "While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done,
>> it was done." --Helen Keller
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> SSB BART Group - Accessibility-on-Demand
> mailto:doug.lee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
> "While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done,
> it was done." --Helen Keller
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