Get Snipping Tool to Open Maximized?

Alonzo Mosley · Sep 9, 2023

antspants said:
Aussie spelling. We often replace with an S what American English uses a Z for. Because life’z complicated.

Actually - and I learned this when I was an American expat/Sydneysider... The "Z" is actually the British spelling.

In the mid 19th-Century, there was a period when England went through a major crush on French culture and adopted the French use of the "S". Because we Yanks had already broken from the Crown, we stuck with what we had.

So we're using the older, more English version. You Ozzies still under the jackboot of the crown, well, that's another story for another day.

Either way, thanks for helping me make my Snipping Tool as optimal as possible with its maximal window.

Alonzo Mosley · Sep 9, 2023

antspants said:
I’m bouncing around my iPooped.

I don't want to know what that means.

hdmi · Sep 9, 2023

SnippingMax.bat

Batch:

@ECHO OFF
FOR /F "tokens=* USEBACKQ" %%F IN (`REG QUERY "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4\Full" /v InstallPath`) DO SET InstallPath=%%F
SET InstallPath=%InstallPath:*REG_SZ =%
FOR /F "tokens=* Eol= " %%F IN ("%InstallPath%") DO SET "InstallPath=%%F"
IF EXIST "%InstallPath%csc.exe" (ECHO ON) ELSE (ECHO ERROR - Missing csc.exe & GOTO end)
"%InstallPath%csc.exe" /out:"%~dp0\SnippingMax.exe" /target:winexe "%~dp0\SnippingMax.cs" /lib:%InstallPath%WPF /r:UIAutomationTypes.dll,UIAutomationClient.dll
:end
@ECHO Press any key to close this command window . . . & PAUSE >NUL

SnippingMax.cs

Code:

using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Threading;
using System.Windows.Automation;

class SnippingMax
{
  [DllImport("user32.dll")]
  static extern public bool ShowWindowAsync(IntPtr hWnd, int nCmdShow);

  [DllImport("user32.dll")]
  [return: MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.Bool)]
  static extern bool GetWindowRect(HandleRef hWnd, out RECT lpRect);

  [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]
  public struct RECT
  {
    public int Left;
    public int Top;
    public int Right;
    public int Bottom;
  }

  private static void OnWindowOpened(object src, AutomationEventArgs e)
  {
    try
    {
      var elem = src as AutomationElement;
      Process proc = Process.GetProcessById(elem.Current.ProcessId);
      if (elem != null && proc.ProcessName == "SnippingTool")
      {
        WindowPattern windowPattern = null;
        windowPattern = elem.GetCurrentPattern(WindowPattern.Pattern) as WindowPattern;
        if (windowPattern.WaitForInputIdle(4000))
        {
          RECT r1;
          if (GetWindowRect(new HandleRef(new Object(), proc.MainWindowHandle), out r1))
          {              
            Thread.Sleep(1000);
            RECT r2 = r1;
            for (int i=10; (i>0) && (r2.Left == r1.Left) && (r2.Top == r1.Top) && (r2.Right == r1.Right) && (r2.Bottom == r1.Bottom); i--)
            {
              if (GetWindowRect(new HandleRef(new Object(), proc.MainWindowHandle), out r2))
              {
                Thread.Sleep(100);
              }
            }
          }
          ShowWindowAsync(proc.MainWindowHandle, 3);
        }
      }
    }
    catch (Exception) {}
    Process.GetCurrentProcess().Kill();
  }

  static void Main(string[] args)
  {
    System.Windows.Automation.Automation.AddAutomationEventHandler(
        WindowPattern.WindowOpenedEvent,
        AutomationElement.RootElement,
        TreeScope.Children,
        OnWindowOpened);
    Process.Start("explorer.exe", "ms-screenclip:");
    Thread.Sleep(Timeout.Infinite);
  }
}

Run SnippingMax.bat to build SnippingMax.exe
Run SnippingMax.exe to start Snipping Tool so it will be maximized within 100 milliseconds after the screenshot opens in it.