Applications stealing focus - reg key no longer fixes

Anonymous
2010-04-08T18:42:59+00:00

I want to prevent any applications from stealing focus in windows 7 (and Vista).  Tweakui used to modify the below Registry key to 0.  Then there was a key that affected the number of flashes a "want to steal focus" window would make in the taskbar.

ForegroundLockTimeout

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop

This reg key is apparently no longer working.  Focus stealing is a major problem, from canceling/oking window that pop-up, to getting virus's from IE windows.  Applications are still written to do this, including MS Office 2007.  If you are typing an email something can pop up and get the next key stroke.  I need to fix this.  Any ideas, or has Windows completely removed a needed feature.

tags: steal focus apps active regedit

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Apps

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Anonymous
2011-10-23T11:13:03+00:00

I solved the problem in this way:

I noticed that just before the focus was "stolen", the PC got "busy" for a second (beside the mouse appeared the small circle indicating the processor is working hard on sth).

So I started the Task Manager and gave a close look at the processes. I noticed that one process took over a relevat percentage of CPU usage exactly an instant before the focus was stolen from the task manager window.

Since it was a process that I don't need to be active all the time (sth about Vodafone Mobile connection, which I rarely use) I just stopped the process and then didn't allow the process to be started every time I turn on the PC. I did this last step using Piriform's free software  "CCleaner", but I'm sure you can find different tools for this...

This was enough to fix it ...

Hope this helped!

Bye!

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-02-24T20:29:54+00:00

    It won't let me get to the form you set up...

    Anyway, the batch file posted about a page ago doesn't cause focus stealing for me either, but this does:

    PING 127.0.0.1 -n 10

    start mstsc

    It seems the 'start' makes a difference.

    Also, this happens all the time with windows updates, and more descructively, 'copying in progress' windows!

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  2. Anonymous
    2012-02-27T14:08:35+00:00

    So I found this

    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957208.aspx

    and thought we are saved, BUT it seems it has fixed the browser javascript alert stealing focus only. LiviuZ batch file still makes mstsc jump to front and Daniel's edit as well. Also checkdisk results steals focus.

    I guess this community is hopeless and I will have to post the same question to

    http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-us/w7itproui/threads

    and maybe there will be a chance that somebody could really look at it...

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-02-29T12:16:09+00:00

    Plug in an iPhone (or anything that triggers autoplay I suspect)

    When my iPhone battery is dying, I plug it in to the PC USB and carry on working, a little while later, I look up and everything I typed is gone because the autoplay window stole focus.

    This happens 100% of the time, on every windows 7 machine I've ever used (about 4/5 I think, but just Ultimate and Pro).

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