Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

Microsoft is locking certain API's:

Always-on-top, Auto-elevation, DPS statistics, Default taskmgr application preferences (Microsoft hardcoded taskmgr.exe blocking competitors), GPU statistics (deliberately broken on Win10 and Win11 recently) and the DirectUI framework are some examples of features that I want to implement and are currently implemented by Task Manager but are Microsoft-only signature restricted while newer more advanced security like PPL that we desperately need are also Microsoft-only signature restricted.




I'm not familiar with the rest but how is Always-on-top locked away? Its such a basic thing and a lot of programs are using it.


SetWindowPos with HWND_TOPMOST fails with Access Denied.

CreateWindowInBand also fails with Access Denied.


That's so weird. No idea why they restricted that but not the other ways of setting a window to always stay on top. Like whatever Firefox's picture-in-picutre uses.

EDIT: I guess they want to prevent you from doing interesting things like staying on top of the lockscreen. This article sheds some light on the Z ordering changes since win8 https://blog.adeltax.com/window-z-order-in-windows-10/


16 new Window bands (layers) is excessive. "Activate Windows" and Cortana each get their very own.

Locking other vendors out of that functionality (eg. can't create a Notifications panel alternative) is anti-competitive and degrades one of the best features of Windows (the ability for others to improve it as they see fit).




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: