Thursday, December 17, 2009

Changing Windows Live Messenger status via Windows messages from HoeKey

I use HoeKey for hotkeys. I love how it's tiny and unobtrusive. It's only using 128K of RAM now. I change instant messaging status via HoeKey so statuses in multiple applications stay synchronized. Here are the lines I use for Windows Live (formerly MSN) Messenger:

=Msg|MSBLWindowClass|273|40166 ; WLM Available
=Msg|MSBLWindowClass|273|40169 ; WLM Away
=Msg|MSBLWindowClass|273|40168 ; WLM Busy
=Msg|MSBLWindowClass|273|40210 ; WLM Sign out


To use those lines, either put a hotkey identifier before the equals sign or append them to other hotkeys. MSBLWindowClass is the window class of the Windows Live Messenger window. 273 means the message is WM_COMMAND. The 5 digit numbers correspond to wParam of the message and identifiers of entries on the File menu. Text after the semicolon is an explanatory comment.

Disclaimer: I don't like Windows Live Messenger. I just use it because it fully supports all the features of the protocol.

1 comment:

Boris Gjenero said...

When running Windows Live Messenger 2011, only the sign out message works. The numbers didn't change for the other messages. I don't know why they don't work. If they're sent while the contact list menu bar is open, Messenger freezes.