Windows not coming to the front

Anonymous
2015-02-24T16:02:00+00:00

Recently, when I click on a running program in the taskbar, it is anyones guess if it will come to the front.  Google chrome behind Blizzard desktop launcher, neither clicking on the program in the taskbar nor clicking on the parts of the window visible to the side of the launcher bring it to the top.  Malwarebytes window open, world of warcraft on top of it, click it and it won't come to the front for several clicks.  Once it is on front, now clicking on wow wont bring wow to the front.  GOM media player, 3 windows open, click torrent client, comes to the front on top of 2 out of three of the gom windows.  Windows explorer windows open browsing files, bring chrome to the front on top of it, clicking explorer in the taskbar will not bring it to the front.  It seems to be totally random.  I ran malwarebytes and got rid of some adware, and for a minute it seemed like that had fixed it.  An hour later and it is happening again.  Spotify on top of file folder window, clicking explorer does not come to the front.

Any help?

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Anonymous
2016-01-02T09:36:13+00:00

I had same problem under windows 10 x64

Tried scf/scannow but no results, the below link solved the problem(although SCF showed corrupted files) 

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows\_7-windows\_programs/newly-opened-programemail-does-not-open-in-front/fe587f90-5815-4d4a-81b5-55325019af1d

1.      Go to start and type regedit.exe.

2.      Navigate to the following location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.

3.      Double click the 'ForegroundLockTimeout' key. Change the notation to decimal.

4.      The default value should be 200000 millisecond in decimal, or 200 seconds. Click OK.

5.      Restart your computer and check if the issue persists.

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  1. Anonymous
    2016-04-10T18:45:42+00:00

    Hi Jacob, mine has reset only once so far... are you restarting your computer after changing the settings?

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-04-10T18:34:35+00:00

    I've done this but it immediately resets back to the hexadecimal notation.

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-03-30T14:00:39+00:00

    Ahmed Yassin you are a God amongst men... Well, maybe a Demigod!

    I have a Lenovo Thinkpad running 64bit Windows 10 and some time several weeks ago it just started refusing to allow me to bring windows to the front - less of the randomness described above, more just a case of anything behind anything else refusing to come forward.

    I used this fix early last week and my computer seemed to work perfectly! I wanted to give it a chance to prove itself before saying thanks so apologies for not giving kudos sooner but this does work... that is, it did work - until today.

    This morning, I was experiencing the same issues, however following the same steps a second time seems to have solved the problem again after a reboot. I do not know why my computer reset the change back to Hexadecimal but it seems while this is a fix, it is not a 100% permanent fix. That said, occasionally resetting the registry entry is a LOT less frustrating that always having to minimise half a dozen windows to get to the one you want...

    Thank you Sir!

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  4. Anonymous
    2016-02-15T14:15:21+00:00

    Seems to have worked so far.

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