How to Write a Screen Recorder in .NET?

Question

Is there a way to make a screen recorder in C#? If so, does anybody know of any tutorials I could use or any information on the subject?

Answer 1

Take a look at this VB.NET code.

Public Class ScreenRecorder

Private Shared tempDir As String = My.Computer.FileSystem.SpecialDirectories.Temp & "snapshot"
Private Shared snap As New System.Threading.Thread(AddressOf Snapshot)
Private Shared _Bounds As System.Drawing.Rectangle = System.Windows.Forms.Screen.PrimaryScreen.Bounds

Public Shared Property Bounds() As System.Drawing.Rectangle
    Get
        Return _Bounds
    End Get
    Set(ByVal value As System.Drawing.Rectangle)
        _Bounds = value
    End Set
End Property

Private Shared Sub Snapshot()
    If Not My.Computer.FileSystem.DirectoryExists(tempDir) Then _
        My.Computer.FileSystem.CreateDirectory(tempDir)
    Dim Co As Integer = 0
    Do
        Co += 1
        System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(50)
        Dim X As New System.Drawing.Bitmap(_Bounds.Width, _Bounds.Height, System.Drawing.Imaging.PixelFormat.Format32bppArgb)
        Using G = System.Drawing.Graphics.FromImage(X)
            G.CopyFromScreen(_Bounds.Location, New System.Drawing.Point(), _Bounds.Size)
            Dim CurBounds As New System.Drawing.Rectangle(System.Windows.Forms.Cursor.Position - Bounds.Location, System.Windows.Forms.Cursor.Current.Size)
            Forms.Cursors.Default.Draw(G, CurBounds)
        End Using
        Dim FS As New IO.FileStream(tempDir & FormatString(Co.ToString, 5, "0"c) & ".png", IO.FileMode.OpenOrCreate)
        X.Save(FS, System.Drawing.Imaging.ImageFormat.Png)
        X.Dispose()
        FS.Close()
    Loop
End Sub

Public Shared Sub ClearRecording()
    If My.Computer.FileSystem.DirectoryExists(tempDir) Then _
    My.Computer.FileSystem.DeleteDirectory(tempDir, FileIO.DeleteDirectoryOption.DeleteAllContents)
    My.Computer.FileSystem.CreateDirectory(tempDir)
End Sub

Public Shared Sub Save(ByVal Output As String)
    Dim G As New Windows.Media.Imaging.GifBitmapEncoder

    Dim X As New List(Of IO.FileStream)
    For Each Fi As String In My.Computer.FileSystem.GetFiles(tempDir, FileIO.SearchOption.SearchTopLevelOnly, "*.png")
        Dim TempStream As New IO.FileStream(Fi, IO.FileMode.Open)
        Dim Frame = Imaging.BitmapFrame.Create(TempStream)
        X.Add(TempStream)
        G.Frames.Add(Frame)
    Next
    Dim FS As New IO.FileStream(Output, IO.FileMode.OpenOrCreate)
    G.Save(FS)
    FS.Close()

    For Each St As IO.FileStream In X
        St.Close()

    Next

End Sub

Public Shared Sub Start()
    snap = New System.Threading.Thread(AddressOf Snapshot)
    snap.Start()
End Sub

Public Shared Sub [Stop]()
    snap.Abort()
End Sub

Private Shared Function FormatString(ByVal S As String, ByVal places As Integer, ByVal character As Char) As String
    If S.Length >= places Then Return S
    For X As Integer = S.Length To places
        S = character & S
    Next
    Return S
End Function

End Class