New Update Hijacks My Tilde Key?

mrpink84

I use tilde for Ditto, a custom clipboard app, and ever since I updated to the most recent Notepad++, it ignores Ditto and just posts the ` instead of activating Ditto. The hotkey works fine as long as Notepad++ isn’t the active window. Why is Notepad++ hijacking this key and how do I change that? Thank you!

PeterJones

@mrpink84 said,

My Tilde Key
… just posts the ` instead of activating Ditto

BTW: ~ is tilde. ` is “grave accent” or “backtick” or similar. On a standard US keyboard, they share a key, with the backtick being the non-shifted and the tilde being the shifted version (the same isn’t true on many international keyboards).

Why is Notepad++ hijacking this key

it’s not, unless you’ve defined that as a shortcut in Notepad++.

Well, actually, as far as I can tell, Notepad++ does not respond to a keyboard shortcut that is only mapped to an unmodified key (“unmodified” meaning “without Ctrl or Shift or Alt or some combination thereof”; thus, Notepad++ will map an action to something like Ctrl+~ but not just ~). In the editor panel, Notepad++ correctly allows you to type a ~ or ` key, so it has not hijacked either of those characters or the key that types them.

If you have a tool like “Ditto” (whatever that is) that is hijacking a single, unmodified key, then that tool is what’s misbehaving, because no tool should hijack across many applications an unmodified keycode for one of the standard keyboard characters – keys like “F1” are “up for grabs” for global assignments across the OS, but it would be considered rude to hijack the keycode for a typeable character across multiple applications. (A tool like AutoHotKey allows you to assign shortcuts across multiple applications, but one shouldn’t use it to redefine a typeable character).

and how do I change that

Since I can see no evidence that Notepad++ has done anything untoward, there’s nothing to do in Notepad++, unless you’ve changed its configuration.

So my recommendation would be to modify Ditto so that it uses Ctrl+~ or Ctrl+` rather than an unmodified key, and thus it won’t get in the way of typing that character in Notepad++ or any other typing-based application in Windows.

mrpink84

@PeterJones Well that stinks. It was definitely a Notepad++ update that changed things, as there was no issue with the global hot key before. Just tried updating the other app and it still works everywhere in any window, but Notepad++. Weird.

EDIT: I have to think it’s related to the macros changes in 8.5.3? Notepad++ seems to be taking more control now within its walls, as is its right I guess. https://community.notepad-plus-plus.org/topic/24464/faq-desk-v8-5-3-macros-and-run-menu-commands

mkupper

@mrpink84 Let’s see if we can confirm that a change to Notepad++ is causing the problem you noticed.

In your first post you wrote “I updated to the most recent Notepad++” but did not say what version that was nor if you are using the installed version, portable version, x32 or x64. Thus, I’ll have to guess a bit and you will need to translate my guesses.

Install portable versions of both the “old” and “new” versions of Notepad++ each in their own directories. Do you need detailed help with this?
Start each copy of Notepad++ using -multiInst on the command line. I’d type something in the blank new-text window of each copy so that you know which version you are looking at as you switch windows.
Bring each of the instances of Notepad++ to the foreground and see if the ` hotkey for Ditto works.

If you can establish that yes, specific versions of Notepad++ have the problem then please include the ? / debug info results of the versions that work or fail to work with Ditto when writing about the issue so that other people can reproduce it. I suspect Notepad++ should not be grabbing another application’s hotkey and so it’s likely the issue will get fixed if you can demonstrate how to reproduce the issue. It looks like Ditto is available from https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/ditto-clipboard/9NBLGGH3ZBJQ

Alan Kilborn

@mkupper said in New Update Hijacks My Tilde Key?:

It looks like Ditto is available from

The store link is light on info. Here’s a link with more: https://ditto-cp.sourceforge.io/

mrpink84

@mkupper Great, thank you! I just saw this reply, and I will take care of this when I have a moment. Sorry about not specifying the version and flavor. I was updated and have since updated to v8.5.4 32-bit and still see the issue. I will get back to you. Thank you again!

mrpink84

@mrpink84 I figured it out! Notepad++ was running in Administrator privileges. This was also breaking the Drag and Drop from a File Explorer window. With the Administrator privileges disabled and it running as a normal application, it’s playing well with everything. I’m not sure how that got changed. I went back to 8.4.2 and noticed the same Drag and Drop issue so decided to disable that and that was it.

mkupper

@mrpink84 Thank you for the troubleshooting and feedback. I found it interesting that apparently Windows prioritizes routing keystrokes to the foreground app if it’s running in administrative mode. From a safety and security standpoint I can see why Windows does that.

Presumably you would see the same behavior if you had an administrative command prompt and tried to use the ` in that the command prompt would get the ` backtick and Ditto does not get activated.

Coises

@mkupper Most likely Ditto is not running with administrator privileges. I’m not familiar with the details, but I’m fairly sure Windows will not process keyboard hooks for input to an application running with administrator privileges unless the hook was also created with administrator privileges. This Superuser discussion might be relevant, though it’s not the same thing.

Victorel Petrovich

@mrpink84 said in New Update Hijacks My Tilde Key?:

Notepad++ was running in Administrator privileges

How did you find out? How can I know one of my apps currently runs with admin priviledges?

Terry R

@Victorel-Petrovich said in New Update Hijacks My Tilde Key?:

How did you find out?

The Notepad++ titlebar will show “administrator”. Additionally running Debug Info will reference the administrator mode as ON.

In admin mode the preferences will likely be different, and that can include backup settings and file storage defaults.

Admin mode is best only used when needing to open/edit a file that your normal account cannot.

Terry

Victorel Petrovich

@Terry-R Ok, thank you for the information.