Windows 7: how to bring a window to the front no matter what other window has focus?

Question

I\'m implementing a task-bar replacement, dock-like application-switcher style program. It\'s doing some unique stuff with OpenGL, and with keyboard shortcuts, so the way it

Answer 1

This answer builds on @nspire and @nergeia above, and wraps in a method to find the window handle (https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2014/10/20/pywin32-how-to-bring-a-window-to-front/) into one convenience function:

def raise_window(my_window):

    import win32con
    import win32gui

    def get_window_handle(partial_window_name):

        # https://www.blog.pythonlibrary.org/2014/10/20/pywin32-how-to-bring-a-window-to-front/

        def window_enumeration_handler(hwnd, windows):
            windows.append((hwnd, win32gui.GetWindowText(hwnd)))

        windows = []
        win32gui.EnumWindows(window_enumeration_handler, windows)

        for i in windows:
            if partial_window_name.lower() in i[1].lower():
                return i
                break

        print('window not found!')
        return None

    # https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6312627/windows-7-how-to-bring-a-window-to-the-front-no-matter-what-other-window-has-fo

    def bring_window_to_foreground(HWND):
        win32gui.ShowWindow(HWND, win32con.SW_RESTORE)
        win32gui.SetWindowPos(HWND, win32con.HWND_NOTOPMOST, 0, 0, 0, 0, win32con.SWP_NOMOVE + win32con.SWP_NOSIZE)
        win32gui.SetWindowPos(HWND, win32con.HWND_TOPMOST, 0, 0, 0, 0, win32con.SWP_NOMOVE + win32con.SWP_NOSIZE)
        win32gui.SetWindowPos(HWND, win32con.HWND_NOTOPMOST, 0, 0, 0, 0, win32con.SWP_SHOWWINDOW + win32con.SWP_NOMOVE + win32con.SWP_NOSIZE)

    hwnd = get_window_handle(my_window)

    if hwnd is not None:
        bring_window_to_foreground(hwnd[0])


raise_window('Untitled - notepad')