How do I convert a Char into a Keycode in .Net?

Question

I want to convert a string into a series of Keycodes, so that I can then send them via PostMessage to a control. I need to simulate actual keyboard input, and I'm wondering if a massive switch statement is the only way to convert a character into the correct keycode, or if there's a simpler method.

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Got my solution - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms646329(VS.85).aspx

VkKeyScan will return the correct keycode for any character.

(And yes, I wouldn't do this in general, but when doing automated testing, and making sure that keyboard presses are responded to correctly, it works reliably enough).

Answer 1

Raymond says this is a bad idea.

http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2005/05/30/423202.aspx

Answer 2

For A-z 1-9 you could try build the char into a keycode string string.Format("KEY_KEY_{0}", char.ToString()) then use Enum.Parse to extract the Enum value, but it's a bit of a cludge

Or look at How to convert uint keycode to Keys enum on expert sexchange, and just work around the tricky cases.

I agree a switch statement is kinda awful

Answer 3

Got my solution - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms646329(VS.85).aspx

VkKeyScan will return the correct keycode for any character.

(And yes, I wouldn't do this in general, but when doing automated testing, and making sure that keyboard presses are responded to correctly, it works reliably enough).

Answer 4

A much more reliable wait to send a string of keystrokes to a window is to use the SendKeys class

 System.Windows.Forms.SendKeys("This is a test");
 System.Windows.Forms.SendKeys("This is sends CTRL+J ^j");

This will be more predictable and should save you some time.