Contents
TopIT 3.0 Help Index

For Help on Help, Press F1

The following Help Topics are available:

How to Use TopIT

TopIT Commands

Window menu

Help menu

Toolbar buttons


Toolbar buttons

Move Window to Top

Releases a window from being on top

Refresh Window List

Displays the TopIT Help window


Help menu

The Help menu offers the following commands, which provide you assistance with this application:

Help for TopIT	Offers you an index to topics on which you can get help.
Using Help	Provides general instructions on using help.
About	Displays the version number of this application and explains how to order application source code.


Window menu

Move Window to Top	Puts the selected window on top giving it the priority to stay there.
Release Window	Releases a window from being on top.
Keep Window on Top	As long as TopIT is active, TopIT will keep the selected window locked on top even if you exit the application and restart it (just as long as you don't change the window's class name.  Only one window can be kept on top at a time..
Stop Keeping Window on Top	Stops keeping a window on top.
Refresh Window List	Refreshes the list of windows.
Put TopIT on Top	Locks the TopIT window on top.


How to Use TopIT

TopIT is a tool that looks through the list of all the top level windows that are active and displays the caption for each in a list box.  After selecting a window in TopIT's list box, you can click on a button to move the window to the topmost z-order so it appears on top of all the other normal windows.

I originally built TopIT so I could lock a Windows Help window on top while I'm using an application.  Now, the newest version of Windows Help let's you lock its window on top by choosing Always on Top in the Help menu.

Help and the DBWIN application that's included with the Microsoft Windows 3.1 SDK and Visual C++ let  you lock its window on top using a menu command.  DBWIN lets you display OutputDebugString messages as well as messages from the debugging version of Windows inside the DBWIN window.   Most of the other Windows programming tools don't give you this option, so you can use TopIT to do it instead.  Some of the application windows you can use TopIT to lock on top are:

Spy, the Windows message monitoring utility from Microsoft.

WinSight, the Windows message monitoring utility from Borland.

STRESS, the Windows environment stress testing utility from Microsoft.

HEAPWALK, the Microsoft utility for viewing global memory.

Another use for TopIT is to lock the application window you are debugging with the Visual C++ Debugger on top with TopIT.  This way, you can set breakpoints in your application OnDraw (WM_PAINT processing) function without having to size the debugger and application window so you can position them side by side on your desktop.

If you want, you can have TopIT remember to keep locking the application window on top--from execution to execution--by choosing the Keep Window on Top command in the TopIT Window menu.  As long as TopIT is active, TopIT will put the selected window back up on top every time it's restarted.

TopIT has some interesting uses and illustrates some useful programming tricks.  By exploring TopIT's source code you will learn more about windows and messages--as well as learn how to build a graphical push button as an alternative to using control windows.  The C source code for Topper (TopIT's predecessor) is available with the book Advanced Tools for Windows Developers book published by Sybex.  You can purchase the Visual C++ source code for TopIT that includes the simple one window application template builder for Visual C++, MakeMFC, directly from Digital Artistry by sending a check for $25 to:

Digital Artistry

1900 Preston Road, Suite 267-230

Plano, TX 75093